2.2

Transcription

2.2

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ABSTRACT
This study investigates a number of differences between Turkish and
English in the area of speech acts of requests and apologies and
links them with different cultural norms and cultural assumptions,
By comparing these two speech acts in two languages, the goal was
to find out whether native knowledge and use of these speech act
patterns influence Turkish students’ performance in English.
The
theoretical and methodological framework for this investigation has
been developed based on a number of studies conducted in the same
area in languages other
questionnaires
than Turkish and English.
(Turkish
and
English)
Two sets of
consisting
of
sixteen
situations, eight eliciting requests and eight eliciting apologies
were used as the instruments for this study.
The data collection
method is based on a set of questionnaires,
and data analysis is
based on a set of coding schemes for the responses elicited from the
questionnaires.
The
data analysis
procedure
is
illustrated
by
giving examples from the data.
The data consist of three sets;
(1) Turkish Baseline,
English Baseline and (3) L2 Experimental Data.
(2)
The coding schemes
consists of two main categories for requests; (1) units of analysis
and (2) directness in requests; and of two categories for apologies;
(1)
semantic
strategies.
formulas
and
(2)
acknowledgement
of
responsibility
This kind of contrastive analysis provided accountable
results for cross-cultural variability in the realization patterns
of
the
same
speech
acts.
The
speech
act
patterns
were
also
described both from social superiors’ and inferiors’ point of view.
Results showed that a number of differences occur between Turkish
and English speech act patterns.
Different patterns and usages led
to students’ negative transfer while similarities led to positive
transfer.
in
It was also found that because of the lack of proficiency
English,
students
sometimes
avoid
using
the
patterns
and
sometimes use them in linguistically incorrect forms in the target
language.
This result suggests that in EEL situations,
the goals
of syllabus design should be based on theoretical descriptions and
research evidence.
It might also be suggested that differences
between learners' native culture and target language cultures should
be emphasized in foreign language teaching.
A SOCIOCULTURAL INVESTIGATION OF SPEECH ACTS
(REQUESTS AND APOLOGIES) IN TURKISH AND ENGLISH
A THESIS
SUBMITTED TO THE INSTITUTE OF ECONOMICS AND SOCIAL
SCIENCES OF.BILKENT UNIVERSITY^ ;
IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS
FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTERS OF ARTS
IN THE TEACHING OF ENGLISH AS A FOREIGN LANGUAGE
BY ,
FATMA MIZIKACI
JULY 1991
m
P
І Ѵ Л
11
BILKENT UNIVERSITY
INSTITUTE OF ECONOMICS AND SOCIAL SCIENCES
MA THESIS EXAMINATION RESULT FORM
July 31, 1991
The examining committee appointed by the
Institute of Economics and Social Sciences for the
thesis examination of the MA TEFL student
Fatma MIZIKACI
has read the thesis of the student.
The committee has decided that the thesis
of the student is satisfactory.
Thesis Title
A sociocultural Investigation of
Speech Acts (Requests and
Apologies) in Turkish and Fnglish
Thesis Advisor
: Dr. James C. Stalker
Bilkent University, MA TEFL
Program
Committee Members
Dr. Lionel M. Kaufman
Program
Mr. William Ancker
Program
Ill
We certify that we have read this thesis and that in our combined
opinion it is fully adequate, in scope and in quality as a thesis
for the degree of Master of Arts.
Lionel M. Kaufma
(Committee Member)
William Ancker
(Committee Member)
Approved for the
Institute of Economics And Social Sciences
Ali Kari^manoglu
Director
Institute of Economics and Social Sciences
IV
To Hazal
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Page
LIST OF TABLES
CHAPTER 1.0
1.1
1 . 1.1
1 . 1.2
1.1.3
1.2
1.3
1.3.1
1.3.2
1.3.3
1.4
1.5
1.6
CHAPTER 2.0
2.1
2.2
2 . 2.1
2 . 2.2
2.2.3
2.2.4
2.3
2.4
2.4.1
2.4.2
2.4.3
2.5
CHAPTER 3.0
3.1
3.2
3.3
3.4
3.4.1
3.4.2
v m
INTRODUCTION
Background and Goals of the Study
Background
Goals of the Study
Statement of Expectations
Statement of Research Question
Definitions
Speech Acts
Requests
Apologies
Statement of Methodological
Procedure
Analytical Procedure
Organization of Thesis
LITERATURE REVIEW
Introduction
Definitions
Definition of Speech Acts
Requests
Apologies
Universality of Speech Acts
Universality of Research in
Pragmatics
Research on Speech Acts of Apologies
and Requests
Influence of Native Language Speech
Act Structure on Second Language
Acquisition
Lack of Proficiency in the Second
Language
Development of an Interlanguage
Conclusion
METHODOLOGY
Introduction
Subjects
Materials
Procedures
Pilot Study
Collection ofTurkish and English
Baseline Data
3.4.2.1 Baseline Data
3.4.2.2 L2 Experimental Data
3.5
Analytical Procedures
1
1
1
2
3
5
6
6
6
7
7
8
9
10
10
10
10
12
12
13
15
17
18
22
23
24
26
26
27
28
29
30
30
30
31
32
VI
3.5.1
3.5.2
The Coding Scheme
Requests
32
32
3.5.2.1
3.5.2.2
3.5.3
3.5.3.1
3.6
Units of Analysis
Directness in Requests
Apologies
Units of Analysis for Apologies
Conclusions
32
33
35
35
37
4.0
4.1
4.1.1
4.1.1.1
4.1.1.2
4.1.2
4.1.3
4.1.3.1
4.1.3.2
4.1.3.3
4.1.4
4.1.4.1
4.1.4.2
4.1.4.3
4.1.5
4.2
4.2.1
4.2.2
4.2.3
4.2.4
4.2.5
TURKISH BASELINE DATA
REQUESTS
Introduction to Analytic Procedures
Coding Scheme
Calculations
The Presentation of Overall Turkish
Data
Units of Analysis
Pre-adjuncts
Head Act
Post-adjunct
Strategies at the most Direct Level
Strategies at the Conventional
Indirect Level
Strategies at the Nonconventional
Indirect Level
Results and Summary
APOLOGIES
Introduction to Semantic Formulas
The Overall Presentation of Data
Expression of Apology
Acknowledgement of Responsibility
Results and Summary
ENGLISH BASELINE DATA
REQUESTS
Overall Presentation of Data
Units of Analysis
Pre-adjuncts
Head Acts
Post-adjunct
Strategies at the most Direct Level
Indirect Level
5.1.3.3 Strategies at the Nonconventional
Indirect Level
Results and Summary
5.1.4
APOLOGIES
5.2
5.2.1
5.2.2
Acknowledgement of Responsibility
5.2.3
5.2.4
Results and Summary
COMPARISON
5.3
5.3.1
Similarities
CHAPTER 5.0
5.1
5.1.1
5.1.2
5.1.2.1
5.1.2.2
5.1.2.3
5.1.3
5.1.3.1
5.1.3.2
38
38
38
38
40
40
41
41
43
44
47
48
50
52
54
55
55
56
57
59
63
68
68
68
70
70
72
72
73
73
74
74
74
75
75
76
77
78
81
81
Vll
5.3.1.1
5.3.1.2
5.3.2
5.3.2.1
5.3.2.2
5.3.3
5.3.4
5.3.4.1
5.3.4.2
CHAPTER 6.0
6.1
6 . 1.1
6 . 1.2
6.1.2.1
6.1.2.2
6.1.2.3
6.1.3
6.1.3.1
6.1.3.2
6.1.3.3
6.1.4
6.2
6 .2.1
6 . 2.2
6.2.3
6.2.4
6.3
6.3.1
6.3.2
CHAPTER 7.0
7.1
7.2
7.2.1
7.2.2
7.3
7.4
7.5
BIBLIOGRAPHY
APPENDICIES
APPENDIX
APPENDIX
Similarities between Turkish and
English Requests
Similarities between Turkish and
English Apologies
Differences
Differences between Turkish and
English Requests
Differences between Turkish and
English Apologies
Major Points
'
Summary
Requests
Apologies
83
83
83
86
86
87
88
88
91
L2 EXPERIMENTAL DATA
93
REQUESTS
94
94
Units of Analysis
95
Pre-adjuncts
96
Head Act
97
Post-adjuncts
98
99
Strategies at the most Direct Level 99
Indirect Level
100
Strategies at the Nonconventional
Indirect Level
101
Results and Summary
102
APOLOGIES
103
104
105
Acknowledgement of Responsibility 106
Results and Summary
107
Experimental Data and General
Conclusions
108
Requests
108
Apologies
109
CUNCLUSION
Summary of the Study
Conclusions
Positive Transfer
Negative Transfer
Assessment of the Study
Suggestions for further Studies
Pedagogical Implications
112
112
114
116
118
119
120
121
133
A. Turkish Questionnaire
B. English Questionnaire
136
141
Vlll
LIST OF TABLES
TURKISH BASELINE TABLES
TABLE
TABLE
TABLE
TABLE
TABLE
TABLE
TABLE
4.1
4.2
4.3
4.4
4.5
4.6
4.7
Pre-adjuncts.
Pre-adjuncts, subcategories
Head Acts.
Post-adjunct.
Directness in Requests.
An Expression of Apology
An Acknowledgement of
Responsibility
45
46
49
51
53
67
71
ENGLISH BASELINE TABLES
TABLE
TABLE
TABLE
TABLE
TABLE
TABLE
5.1
5.2
5.3
5.4
5.5
5.6
Pre-adjunct
Head Acts
Post-adjunct
Responsibility
79
81
83
84
89
91
EXPERIMENTAL DATA
TABLE
TABLE
TABLE
TABLE
TABLE
TABLE
TABLE
6.1
6.2
6.3
6.4
6.5
6.6
6.7
Pre-adjunct
Pre-adjuncts, subcategories
Head Acts
Post-adjunct
Responsibility
110
111
113
115
117
122
124
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I would like to express my gratitude to Dr. James C. Stalker,
my
thesis
advisor,
for giving me guidance and support with
the
present format of this thesis.
I am also grateful
to Dr.
Lionel Kaufman and Mr.
William
Ancker, Bilkent University, MA TEFL program Fulbright lecturers for
their comments.
I must express my deepest gratitude to Dr. James C. Stalker,
Dr. Lionel Kaufman and Mr. William Ancker for permitting me to use
their computers and printer.
I would also
like
to thank my sisters
and close
friends.
Şahika, Tülin and Aysen for their contributions to this thesis.
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
1.1 Background and Goals of the Study
1.1.1
Background
In
second
differences
language
in
comprehension
norms
and
communication.
learning
of
speech
performance
When
cross
acts
may
causing
learners
violate
linguistic
affect
problems
the
norms
in
of
conversation in the target language, the violations are
potentially
much
more
serious
than
syntactic
or
pronunciation errors since such violations can affect
what is often termed "the presentation of self" (Richards
1980).
Research on the cross-cultural investigation of
speech acts has shown that interference and transfer can
occur especially when the cultural gap is considerably
wide
between
the
cultures
language communities.
of
the
native
and
target
Wierzbicka (1985) points out that
"different cultures find expressions in different systems
of speech acts,
and that different speech acts become
entrenched, and, to some extent, codified in different
languages" (p. 146).
Because English and Turkish are languages from two
different families and because the cultures reflect two
very
different
histories
with
some,
but
relatively
little, contact, it was assumed that the opportunity for
communicative difficulty would be particularly likely.
Universal speech acts would be coded differently, could
reflect a different frequency of occurrence, and could
appear in different contexts.
In short, the pragmatic
distribution would be such that communication would fail.
Being aware of the problem,
or at least the potential
problem, suggests that research needs to be conducted to
determine where Turkish and English differ to such an
extent that communication can fail.
In fact, it is the
responsibility of the EFL teacher to know as much as
possible about the pragmatics of language as about the
syntax
and
phonology
in
order
to
help
"present" themselves accurately and well.
explore this area,
learners'
EFL
students
In order to
this study focuses on how Turkish
native knowledge and use of the speech act
rules, in particular of requests and apologies, influence
their comprehension and use of the English patterns for
those speech acts.
1.1.2
Goals of the Study
The goals of this study are
(1) To establish Turkish and English patterns of
the speech acts of request and apology as they pertain
to different social constraints.
(2) To establish the similarities and differences
between
Turkish
and
English
speech
act
patterns
of
request and apology as they pertain to the same social
constraints.
(3)
To
ascertain
whether
Turkish
EFL
learners
transfer their LI rules of speech act patterns to their
L2 .
Specifically, the goal is to find out whether the
request and apology patterns of Turkish and English are
coded
differently
interfering
with
and
the
occur
differently
production
of
patterns by Turkish EFL learners.
these
thereby
speech
act
Based on the data
described in this study, the potential for communication
failure for these speech acts in a cross-cultural setting
will be assessed.
1.1.3
Statement of Expectations
There has been no investigation comparing Turkish
and English speech act patterns in this aspect of crosscultural
differences
so
far.
Most
of
the
research
carried out so far on speech act patterns indicate that
the
speakers
levels
of
of
different
directness.
languages
For
prefer
example,
in
different
a
detailed
empirical study of requests, as Kasper showed that native
speaker norms for levels of directness differ in German
and
in English
(ctd.
in Odlin,
1989).
German usage
allows far more directness in requests than does British
English
usage.
For example,
German
speakers
show a
strong preference for modal forms suggesting a sense of
obligation, as in Du solltest das Fenster zumachen ("You
should
close
the
window"),
whereas
English
speakers
prefer modal forms with a weaker force, as in "Can you
close the window?"
speakers
more
Moreover,
often prefer
it appears that German
declarative
statements
in
contrast
to
English
speakers,
who
more
often
prefer
interrogative statements to make requests.
The
significance
of
a
request
varies
as
well.
Coulmas analyzed Japanese apology norms, and concluded
that:
In Japan the smallest favor makes the receiver
a debtor.
Social relations can be regarded,
to a large extent, as forming a reticulum of
mutual responsibilities and debts. Not every
favor can be repaid, and if circumstances do
not allow proper repayment, Japanese tend to
apologize. They acknowledge the burden of the
debt and their own internal discomfort about
it. (Odlin, 1989, p. 54)
In English, requests are not always viewed as a favor,
a
debt
requiring
repayment.
But
in
Turkish,
they
sometimes require repayment in certain cases.
Similarly, problems between Turkish and English speakers
may arise from the differences in the frequency of use
of apologetic
formulas,
English
speakers
tend to use
apologetic formulas such as pardon me and excuse me when
their speaking is interrupted, for example by a cough,
while Turkish speakers less often tend to apologize in
the same kinds of situations.
is
bilingual
but
unfamiliar
An American speaker who
with
the
differences
in
frequency of Turkish apologetic usage may perceive the
Turkish
speaker
as
rude.
context of hierarchic
Also,
apologies,
family relations,
in
the
appear to be
less frequent in Turkish than in English: elderly people
in
a
family--parents, grandparents--are
expected
to
apologize
to
their
not
children.
usually
Thus,
a
Turkish
learner
may
not
apologize
or
expect
to
be
apologized to in these kinds of situations.
One of my personal experiences led me to do this
research.
At
Gazi
University,
upper
intermediate
students were asked to respond in a situation where they
had missed
an appointment with
the
teacher
a second
time, and they were to apologize to the teacher.
of
the
students
responded
by putting
formula at the end of the sequence.
the
Most
apologetic
The following are
two of the responses received:
1. I had a headache and I couldn't come. I am very
sorry.
2. I bumped my car into another and I had to wait
for the police. I am sorry.
In both responses the sequence of events seems to
be
transferred
clearly
directly
relevant
to
from
the
Turkish,
situation
and
(being
they
are
intended
apologies), but from the point of view of the English
speaker,
they are considerably weakened by expressing
the apology at the end (Cohen and Olshtain, 1986).
1.2 Statement of Research Question
In this study, productive performance in
and
apologies
structural
order
of
is measured
appropriateness
events
and
in
terms
which
choice
is
of
requests
cultural
and
indicated by the
of words.
A particular
structure in Turkish may be allowed and be appropriate
in certain situations while it may not be allowed in the
same situations
in English.
Thus,
the question to be
answered through the analysis of the data in this study
is
how
the
speech
differences
act
apologies,
patterns,
between
in
Turkish
particular
and
English
requests
and
influence Turkish students’ performance
in
English for these speech act patterns.
1.3 Definitions
1.3.1 Speech Acts
Speech acts are defined as linguistic acts involved
in all communication (Searle, 1969). The production or
issuance of a sentence token under certain conditions is
a speech act, and speech acts are the basic or minimal
units
of
linguistic
sentence,
making
inherent
function
established
relation
by
to
communication.
a
statement,
of
the
looking
existing
beliefs
illocutionary force.
offer,
speech
simply
In
act
at
promise,
a
the
which
might
be
act
itself
in
the
is
uttering
involved
in
its
In other words, the illocutionary
force of an utterance is somehow conventionally linked
with
explicit
performatives
and
other
illocutionary
force-indicating devices (Hudson, 1980). (See Chapter II
for a full definition)
1.3.2 Requests
Requests
Levinson,
ctd.
are
in
face-threatening
Blum-Kulka,
acts
1982);
(Brown
by
making
and
a
request, the speaker impinges on the hearer's claim to
freedom of action and freedom from imposition.
1.3.3 Apologies
Apologies are generally post-event acts involving
loss of face for the speaker and support for the hearer.
By
apologizing,
speakers
recognize
the
fact
that
a
violation of a social norm has been committed and admit
to,the fact that they are at least partially involved in
its cause.
Since there are such a large variety of requests
and apologies,
this study focuses on the requests and
apologies addressed to social superiors and inferiors
such as the requests from a student to a teacher and
vice versa.
1.4 Statement of Methodological Procedure
In order to collect the data for English requests
and apologies, a questionnaire was given to three native
speakers of English and twenty-two native speakers of
Turkish.
The results yield a measure of apologies and
requests for the particular situations used in the study
to be used as a basis for assessing Turkish learners'
patterns
in English.
acceptable
In order
to set up norms
Turkish apologies and requests,
for
twenty-two
Turkish students were given the same questionnaire in
Turkish,
including eight requests and eight apologies,
parallel to the English ones.
This procedure provides
a measure of apologies and requests by Turkish students
in their native language to determine whether influence
from the patterns of their native language occur when
8
producing them in the target language.
1.5 Analytical Procedure
Assessment of the results is based on these three
questions:
1.
Do Turkish
learners of English use syntactic
features of requests and apologies inappropriately, that
is in a way that native speakers of English would not?
2. Does their choice of structure make them sound
too formal or informal, inappropriate to the situation,
in expressing the apology and the request?
3.
Do
their
native
cultural
norms
interfere
in
choosing these inappropriate structures?
In order to analyze the data elicited from the
groups studied, coding schemes for categorizing requests
and apologies were developed based on Blum-Kulka's and
Olshtain's (1984),and Cohen and Olshtain's (1986) model
associated with these particular speech acts.
Requests
are examined under the titles of units of analysis and
in terms of directness while apologies are presented in
terms of a semantic formula proposed by Fraser (qtd. in
Cohen
and
Olshtain,
1986)
and
strategy
types
in
apologies.
1.6 Organization of Thesis
Chapter II presents the full definition of terms
and the review of professional literature through the
research on the socio-cultural aspect of speech acts.
Chapter III describes how the data was collected
and what kind of instruments were used in the collection
of the data.
Chapter
IV presents
baseline data.
the analysis
of
the Turkish
Chapter V involves the analysis of the
English baseline data and the comparison of two kinds of
results.
Chapter
experimental
L2
VI
data
presents
and
the
the
analysis
comparison
of
of
the
general
conclusions and experimental data analysis results.
Finally,
chapter
study, conclusions and
VII
presents
implications.
a
summary
of
the
CHAPTER II
LITERATURE REVIEW
2.1 Introduction
This review aims at formulating a general point of
view about the effects of cross-cultural differences on
learning
speech
apologies.
acts,
in
particular
requests
and
Because there are no studies of this kind,
focused on Turkish, this chapter summarizes the studies
on the languages other than Turkish and gives a general
view about how and to what extent transfer seems to occur
in
learning
speech
act
realizations
in
a
second
language.
2.2 Definitions
2.2.1 Definition of Speech Acts
The concept "speech act" was first introduced in
modern language philosophy by Austin in his book How to
Do Things with Words (1962).
utterances,
Austin proposed that some
such as I order you,
I christen you, or I.
now pronounce you man and wife are events in themselves.
He also argued that the different functions of speech
must be formulated in terms of a general theory of social
activity.
The well-known philosopher
analysis
of
speech
acts,
argued
Searle (1969), in his
that
communication involves linguistic acts.
all
linguistic
"The unit of
linguistic communication is not as has generally been
supposed,
the symbol or word or sentence or even the
11
token of the symbol or word or sentence, but rather the
production or issuance of the symbol or word or sentence
in the performance of a speech act"
(Giglioli,
1972,
pp. 136-137 ). Searle defines speech act as the production
or issuance of a sentence token under certain conditions
proposing it as the basic or minimal unit of linguistic
communication.
Some
examples
of
speech
acts
are
statements, questions, commands, promises, apologies and
requests.
In uttering
a sentence
in an appropriate
context with certain intentions, a speaker performs one
or
more
involves
illocutionary
an
content.
acts.
illocutionary
For instance,
leave the room"
and
An
force
illocutionary
and
a
propositional content,
propositional
the two utterances
"leave the room!"
act
"you will
have
namely that you will
the same
leave the
room; but characteristically the first of these has the
illocutionary force of a prediction and the second has
the illocutionary force of an order (Searle, 1969).
After
Austin's
Hancher defined
and.. Searle's
analysis,
in
1979
illocutionary acts (speech acts) as acts
performed in the uttering of a meaningful utterance; it
is different both from the mere uttering (a locutionary
act), and from the causing of any contingent consequence
(a perlocutionarv act).
Another
definition
of
speech
act
emphasizes its function in a social context
by
Hudson
suggesting
it as "a bit of speech produced as part of a bit of
12
social interaction - as opposed to the linguist's and
philosopher's decontextualised examples" (1980, p.llO).
2.2.2 Requests
In the linguistic analysis of speech acts (Austin,
1962), requests are defined as directives which are the
giving of a decision in favor of or against a certain
course of action or advocacy of it.
Specifically, having
an effect on the hearer's claim to freedom of action and
freedom
from imposition,
the
speaker asks the hearer
about his ability to do the act.
In other words, if a
speaker wants to get an addressee to do something and if
s/he does not assume that s/he could force the addressee
to do it s/he would normally use a request.
2.2.3 Apologies
An apology, in Searle's (1969) taxonomy, is defined
as an expressive that expresses the psychological state
specified in the sincerity condition about a state of
affairs specified in the propositional content.
The act
of apology is called for when there is some behavior that
violates social norms.
When an action or an utterance
(or the lack of either) results in the fact that one or
more persons perceive themselves as deserving an apology,
the culpable person is expected to apologize.
A person who apologizes for doing A expresses regret
at having done A.
if
the
speaker
Thus, the apology act takes place only
believes
that
some
act
A
has
been
performed prior to the time of speaking and that this act
13
A has resulted in an infraction which affected another
person who is now deserving of an apology.
the apologizer believes
Furthermore,
that he or she was
at least
partly responsible for the offence (Fraser, 1980).
2.2.4 Universality of Speech Acts
On theoretical grounds speech acts have generally
been considered as universal elements of any linguistic
communication and classified in terms of the universal
elements they involve.
In one of the most prominent
analysis of speech acts, Searle (1962) argued that speech
acts are worth study in the philosophy of language as
they are called language acts or linguistic acts being
essential to any specimen of linguistic communication
that
involves
a
linguistic
act.
To
perform
an
illocutionary act is to engage in a rule- governed form
of behavior.
This rule-governed form of behavior is what
Searle implicitly refers to as the universality of speech
acts.
In order for an illocutionary act be performed,
some necessary and sufficient conditions are required.
Thus, proposing speech acts as universal linguistic acts
to
any
language,
(constitutive
and
Searle
states
regulative
certain
rules)
illocutionary acts in their performance.
that
rules
govern
He considers
rules like "one ought not to utter obscenities at formal
gatherings," as not so crucial rules in explicating the
semantics
of
a
language
adding
that
rules
for
illocutionary acts being performed are not like the rules
14
of etiquette.
While
Searle
universal
ground,
analyzed
Hudson
speech
(1980)
act
rules
concentrates
on
on
a
the
social aspect of speech acts referring to the distinction
between the illocutionary and perlocutionary forces of
a
speech
act:
function
the
distinction
(illocutionary
between
force)
and
the
inherent
its
effects
(perlocutionary force) whether intended or actual seems
to
reflect
a general
tendency
to categorize
social interaction in two different ways.
bits
of
"This parallel
between the functional classification of speech and of
other types of social behavior is exactly what we might
expect, given the view that speech is just one kind of
social behavior"
(Hudson,
1980, pp.
110-111).
Hudson
also proposes the concept used in classifying speech acts
as the typical cultural concepts,
in being defined in
terms of prototypes, e.g., in defining the conditions for
something
to
count,
say',
as
a
promise.
Then
he
concludes:
If
speech
act
categories
are
cultural
concepts, we might expect them to vary from
one society to another.
One of the standard
examples of a type of speech act which has a
distinctive
illocutionary
force
is
the
baptizing of a person into the Christian
faith. This particular illocutionary force is
clearly restricted to societies in which
baptism takes place, and there are many other
similar
examples
of
culture
specific
illocutionary force, (p. Ill)
In
the
apologies
light
of
these
are considered
two
views,
to reflect
requests
culture
and
specific
15
functions and universal elements, such as directness in
requests (see Chapter IV for full explanation).
Thus,
they will be analyzed on the basis of the descriptions
made on the universal theory of speech acts and in terms
of their cultural functions.
2.3 Universality of Research in Pragmatics
One
of
the
basic
challenges
for
research
in
pragmatics is the issue of universality: to what extent
is it possible
to determine
the degree
to which the
rules that govern the use of language in context vary
from culture to culture and from language to language?
Answers
to
this
cross-cultural
linguists,
essential
question
research
have
in
cross-cultural
in coping with
to
be
sought
through
For
applied
pragmatics.
research
the
in
applied
pragmatics
aspect
is
of this
issue of universality: to what extent is it possible to
specify the
given
will
particular pragmatic
language,
have
to
rules
acquire
which
rules
second
in, order
to
of use
language
attain
for a
learners
successful
communication in the target language.
The issue of universality is especially relevant in
the context of speech act studies.
have
been
conducted
1981; Kasper,
conclude
that
empirically
A number of studies
(Cohen
and Olshtain,
1981; House, 1982; Blum-Kulka, 1982) and
second
language
speakers might fail to
communicate effectively, committing pragmatic failures,
even when they have an excellent grammatical and lexical
16
command of the target language.
The methodological framework set up for the study
of requests and apologies
that observed diversity
is based on the assumption
in the realization of speech
acts in context may stem from at least three different
types
of
variability:
variability;
(b)
(a)
intra-cultural
cross-cultural
situational
variability;
(c)
individual variability (Blum-Kulka and Olshtain, 1984).
Thus,
there
might
be
systematic
differences
in
the
realization patterns of speech acts, depending on social
constraints
embedded
in
the
situation.
On
another
dimension, within the same set of social constraints,
members of one culture might tend to express a request
more or less directly than members of another culture.
Finally,
differ
individuals
in
depending
their
within
speech
on personal
the
act
variables
same
society
realization
such as
might
patterns,
sex,
age
or
level of education.
Furthermore, in order to establish
the
second
ways
patterns
in which
differ
from
those
language
of
speakers'
native
use
speakers,
of
the
question of how the different intra-cultural sources of
variability account for actual use in the two languages,
the learner's native and target languages, needs to be
answered.
2.4 Research on Speech Acts of Apologies and
Requests
17
Research on the cross-cultural aspect of speech act
patterns has mostly suggested three kinds of problems
that would be found
in the production of speech act
patterns in a target language:
(1) the native language
interference; (2) the lack of proficiency in the target
language and (3) the development of an interlanguage in
the actual use of target language speech act patterns.
The following section covers a brief discussion of each
factor under these titles.
2.4.1 Influence of Native Language Speech Act
Structures on Second Language Acquisition
Several
studies
addressing
speech
acts
and
interference in second language learning have tended to
examine
the
languages.
cross-cultural
differences
between
two
Results mostly show that learners seem to
transfer
their
native
language
patterns
speech
when
they
patterns of target language.
act
patterns
attempt
to
to target
use
these
Borkin and Reinhart (1978)
studied how this transfer may inhibit the communication,
for instance,
between an American and a Japanese or a
Thai speaker.
In their study, they investigated the use
of excuse me and I am sorry with Japanese and Thai ESL
students using English.
Their research basically refers
to two basic definitions of Excuse me and I am sorry:
(1) a definition of excuse me as a formula to remedy a
past or immediately forthcoming breach of etiquette or
other minor offense on the part of the speaker, and (2)
18
a definition of I am sorrv as an expression of dismay or
regret
at
an
unpleasantness
suffered
by
the
speaker
and/or the addressee.
In the light of these definitions,
they examined
reasons for the inappropriateness of some uses of excuse
me and I am sorrv on the part of non-native speakers of
English, and they pointed out the importance of cultural
knowledge
for
the
accurate
interpretation
generalizations about these formulas.
of
On the basis of
informal observations of intermediate and upper level
students of English, at the English Language Institute
of the University of Michigan, responding to role play
situations, they concluded that the politeness formulae
represent an area of English which non-native speakers
have some difficulty in controlling.
They cite as an
example a Japanese student responding "I am sorry" to an
American saying, "I have so much work to do!"
Here the
relation between apologies and expressions of gratitude
seems to occasion particular difficulty. They concluded
that differences in the relation between apologies and
other
speech acts
can
lead
to
inappropriate
uses
of
apologetic formulas because of imperfect matches between
these forms and analogous forms in the students' native
language.
Cohen and Olshtain (1981), focusing on the speech
act of apology again, investigated one aspect of socio
cultural competence; the ability to use the appropriate
19
socio-cultural
rules
of
speaking,
culturally acceptable way
by
reacting
in
a
in context and by choosing
stylistically appropriate forms for that context.
The
subjects were 32 native Hebrew speakers who served as
informants in English L2, 12 who served as informants in
Hebrew LI, and 12 Americans who served as informants in
English LI.
eight
These subjects were asked to role-play in
situations
in
which
an
apology
was
expected.
Their findings showed that the non-native speakers of
English, here Hebrew speakers, sometimes did not use all
the expected semantic formulas because of the influence
of native language patterns.
is possible
to
They also found that it
identify culturally and
stylistically
inappropriate L2 utterances in apology situations.
They suggest that studies in the classroom dealing
with overt teaching of such speech act behavior should
be encouraged.
In other words,
the question of how
effectively
learners can be taught
that
can
they
use
them
such behaviors
successfully
in
so
actual
communication situations needs to be answered.
In a study on the differences between English and
Polish in the area of the speech act of request and its
transfer with different cultural norms and assumptions,
Wierzbicka (1985) concluded that English cultural norms,
as compared with Polish norms,
acts
aiming
addressee,
at
and
favor "indirectness" in
bringing
about
suggested
that
an
action
cultural
from
the
differences
20
cannot
be
minimized
completely
by
education.
language
eliminated,
enlightened,
norms
they
well-planned
She argued that
specific
but
of
can
be
multicultural
it is important
interaction with
to link
specific
cultural values, such as the autonomy of the individual
and
the
anti-dogmaticism
of
Anglo-Saxon
culture
or
cordiality and warmth in Polish culture.
Apologies and requests have been researched in a
similar study called the "Cross-Cultural Study of Speech
Acts Realization Patterns"
Olshtain (1984).
speakers
(CCSARP)
by Blum-Kulka and
Data from both native and non-native
revealed
that
in requesting
behavior
it
is
possible to distinguish among central phenomena such as
strategy types as different from internal and external
modification; requesting behavior is inherently based on
choices from a variety of options ranking from direct to
indirect ones; and the scale of indirectness encompassed
at
least
three
main
conventionally
types
indirect,
of
options
and
(direct,
non-conventionally
indirect).
Apologies
second
by
language
Danish
as well
learners
as
of
the native
English
in
the
language were
examined in an empirical study by Trosberg (1987).
She
concluded that pragmatic strategies are transferred from
the
native
gradual
language
increase
in
to the second
the
use
of
language noting a
certain
grammatical
markers drawn from the native language for politeness
21
relative to an increase in competence, similar to that
noted in native language acquisition by children.
She
also observed a lack of utterances that minimize the
offence, such as blaming someone else or responding with
a rhetorical query.
strategies,
She suggests that the lack of these
which
language,
may
cannot
be
due
be
to
traced
the
to
high
the
native
linguistic
and
cognitive demands they place on the learner.
It seems that research on the transfer of native
speech act rules to second language patterns suggests an
influence
speech
of LI patterns
acts
in
the
in the production
target
language.
As
speakers may transfer their perceptions
perform
in
a
given
situation
from
of
a
these
result,
about how
native
to
language
behavior to a second language situation.
2.4.2 Lack of Proficiency in the Second Language
Other than interference, lack of perfect mastery of
the
target
language
and
lack
of
proficiency
in
the
target language may lead learners to produce speech act
patterns
in
L2
both
stylistically
and
culturally
inappropriate. In the study by Cohen and Olshtain (1981)
mentioned
above,
another
finding
considered
as
an
important factor as cross-cultural interference is the
seeming lack of proficiency in the target language that
leads
the
learners
inappropriate utterances.
to
produce
stylistically
22
It often happens that nonnative speakers are aware
of the sociolinguistic need to use the correct speech
act patterns, yet because their linguistic competence is
limited, they use erroneous language forms and produce
speech
acts
that
sound
deviant
or
even
create
communication failure (Cohen and Olshtain, 1983).
study
in which
cross-cultural
differences
In a
in apology
situations were investigated between Hebrew and English
(Cohen
and
Olshtain,
considerable
performance
number
1983),
of
deviated
cases
it
was
found
in which
from the most
the
that
nonnative
acceptable
utterances were merely in linguistic form.
a
native
For example,
in a situation where the speaker bumps into a woman in
the way and says "I'm very sorry but what I can do? It
can't be stopped."
Here the speaker meant to use the
word "avoided," but did not know it and therefore chose
"stopped," creating a deviant explanation.
2.4.3 Development of an Interlanguage
Recent research on speech acts shows that learners
may develop an interlanguage of speech act performance
which can differ from both first and second language
usage in linguistic form and/or procedure or strategy.
Koike
(1989)
studied
the
interlanguage
of
the
speech act of request performance of adult U.S. native
speakers of English who are beginning Spanish learners
studying
in
their
own
country.
A
listening
comprehension procedure to verify learners' perception
23
of L2 speech acts was used to elicit the data.
suggest
that
native
language
pragmatic
The data
knowledge
of
politeness in speech acts is present in many learners'
consciousness, since these rules are strongly ingrained
in them from the age of two years.
Yet, they may not
always be manifested in either second language or native
language production.
In fact only approximately one-
half of the respondents in the less complex situations
of
the
two presented
in the
study transferred
their
politeness rules to their second language speech acts to
produce polite structures somewhat comparable to native
language patterns.
2.5 Conclusion
Research on speech act patterns in L2 is generally
developed focusing on two components of speech acts: (1)
universality
of
the
rules
that
govern
speech
act
production and (2) sociocultural aspect of speech acts.
On the basis of these two issues, most research focused
on the cross-cultural differences in the production of
speech acts in L2 basing their theories on the universal
descriptions
far.
and elements of speech acts proposed
Research
on
speech
act
realization
shows
so
that
problems in second language performance may arise from
a
few
reasons.
The
primary
one
interference in second language,
is native
language
the second reason is
the lack of mastery of the second language patterns or
lack of proficiency in the second language, and the last
24
one can be cited as the development of an interlanguage
in
the
patterns.
actual
use
of
second
language
speech
act
In the present study all of these factors
will be taken into account in considering the results.
CHAPTER III
METHODOLOGY
3.1 Introduction
As the review of recent research on sociocultural
competence
and
performance
has
shown,
developing
pragmatic competence in a second language is not easy,
but is crucial for second language learners.
In order
to help learners develop sociocultural competence,
we
need to know what it is they are developing, what the
features of the systems are.
Blum-Kulka and Olshtain
Recognizing this need,
(1984) proposed a contrastive
speech act analysis to establish comparability at two
levels:
at
the procedural
level,
that
is
contextual
features of the situation; and at the level of linguistic
realization, that is, the grammatical and lexical choices
within conventionalized patterns.
In order
languages,
to
compare
speech
act
behavior
across
the description of systematic relationships
that hold between pragmatic preconditions necessary for
the performance of an act and its linguistic realization
need to be described.
The linguistic realization
is
subject to language specific constraints in grammatical
and
lexical
formulaic
formality.
usage,
patterns
and
for
appropriate
use
at
conventions
different
levels
or
of
That is why an analysis of speech acts has
to provide comparability at these two levels.
27
Hymes,
(qtd.
in
Holmes,
1986)
defined
the
fundamental problem facing linguists as "to discover and
explicate
the
competence
that
enables
members
community to conduct and interpret speech.
of
a
The primary
concern now must be with descriptive analysis from a
variety of communities" (p. 67).
about providing a "heuristic
Therefore, Hymes set
scheme"
whose value was
immediately recognized and which became an indispensable
framework for descriptive sociolinguistic work.
Concepts
such as "speech situation," "speech event," and "speech
act,"
introduced
1964)
are
now
in Hymes's earliest writings
regarded
as
the
basic
tools
(1962,
of
all
sociolinguistic research (Holmes, 1986).
3.2
Subjects
The data were collected from twenty-two university
students studying English as a foreign language at Gazi
University in Ankara.
Subjects were upper intermediate
level students in their third year at the university.
All the subjects were native speakers of Turkish.
Since
this study did not aim to analyze the data on the basis
of demographic variations, the variables concerning this
variation
were
not
taken
into
consideration
in
the
selection of subjects, although a study focusing on these
variables could be instructive. The subjects included in
this study were randomly selected university students
aged between 19-24, both male and female.
3.3
Materials
28
In
order
Turkish
LI
and
experimental
was used.
to
English
data,
the
LI
comparability
baseline
data
of
and
the
the L2
a controlled elicitation procedure
The instrument used to elicit the data was a
questionnaire
simulated
presenting
natural
differentiated
eight
maximize
to
a
contexts.
situations,
elicit
set
of
situations
The
eight
apologies,
sixteen
to
each
description of the situation,
elicit
that
socially
requests,
included
a
short
specifying the setting,
the social distance between the interlocutors and their
status relative to each other.
The main concern of the
study was to determine the patterns used when addressing
superiors
and
situations
inferiors.
defined
inferiors while
social
Four of
requests
the
eight
from social
superiors
the other four defined
inferiors
to
superiors.
request
requests
The
same
set
to
from
of
conditions was followed in the apology sequences.
The
first
was
version
prepared
Discourse
of
based
the
on
Completion
questionnaire
Blum-Kulka
Test,
and
and
of
the
questionnaire
English
Olshtain's
Cohen
(1986) Situational Apology Instrument.
examples
in
and
(1984)
Olshtain's
The following are
items.
The
first was
constructed to elicit a request from a social inferior
(student)
to a superior
(teacher)
and
the
second to
elicit an apology from a social superior (student) to an
inferior (taxi driver):
29
(1) In a professor's office: You have a very short
time to finish your seminar paper.
to give
an extension.
You ask him/her
What would you
say to
him/her?
(2) In a taxi: You take a taxi to Kizilay.
You are
in a hurry and you have completely forgotten to pay.
The taxi driver runs after you and asks for the
money politely.
From the answers
What would you say to him?
given
to
(1) we can learn the
preferences speakers have for realizing a request for
action between social superiors and inferiors.
A cross
linguistic comparison of the answers provided for the
same item will tell us whether there are differences in
the type of strategy chosen to realize the act under the
same social situations between nonnative Turkish speakers
of English and native speakers of English.
From the
answers to (2) we can tell whether Turkish speakers as
learners of English consider it appropriate to apologize
in
the
specific
situation,
and
if
they
do,
what
strategies they use for realizing the act, as compared
to native speakers of English.
3.4 Procedures
The data collection procedure included three stages:
(1) pilot study (2) collection of Turkish and English
baseline data and (3) L2 experimental data.
3.4.1 Pilot study
30
The questionnaire was pilot-tested with a group of
sixteen Turkish students at Bilkent University and four
Turkish university teachers teaching English as a foreign
language in Türkiye.
The goal of the pilot test was to
establish the contextual appropriateness of the items in
eliciting the speech acts under study,
whether
the
situations
indeed
i.e.
elicited
to check
requests
and
apologies, and whether the situations were appropriate
to
the
cultural
results were
expectations
checked
of
the
students.
and no change was
The
made.
As a
result, the questionnaire was found reliable in eliciting
the speech acts under study.
3.4.2 Collection of Turkish and English Baseline
Data
3.4.2.1 Baseline Data
In this stage of the procedure,
the same set of
situations was translated into Turkish keeping the main
features
of
the
social
contexts
presented
in
the
questionnaire. Since there are no comparative studies on
Turkish
and
English
nor
any
in
Turkish
which
could
provide the data to analyze Turkish request and apology
patterns required in such a comparative study, the pilot
tested questionnaire was given to twenty-two subjects who
were selected for this study. The same group was used for
baseline and experimental data.
The goal was to elicit
the Turkish usage of speech act patterns in the given
situations.
In a classroom setting, the students were
31
asked to complete the questionnaire in approximately an
hour.
The instructions were provided in the written form
in the first part of the questionnaire,
and they were
read aloud by the instructor before the questionnaire was
given.
In the instructions the students were asked to
respond to the situations, thereby providing the speech
act aimed at in the given context.
Since the studies have been carried out on English
speech act patterns have not been found appropriate for
the
comparative
purpose
of
this
study,
the
same
questionnaire was given to three native English speakers
to elicit the appropriate English speech act patterns in
the given situations. The native speakers, two Americans
and one British,
are professors of English at Bilkent
University.
3.4.2.2 L2 Experimental Data
The L2 experimental data were collected from the
subjects who were used in· eliciting the Turkish baseline
data.
They were given
setting.
the questionnaire
in a class
The instructions in which they were asked to
respond to the situations in English were provided in
written form in the first part of the questionnaire.
The
instructor also read the instructions aloud before they
started to answer. They were also asked to finish it in
an hour. In this stage, the time given was not sufficient
due to the length of the situations.
3.5
Analytical Procedures
32
3.5.1 The Coding Scheme
The analysis of the data (to be given in detail in
Chapter IV) yielded by the responses to the situations
will
be
based
on
an
independent
evaluation
of
response according to a number of dimensions.
dimensions
will
be
given
operational
each
These
definitions,
presented in the form of a coding scheme.
The scheme
comprises two main parts - one for requests and one for
apologies - and each of these in turn is subdivided into
relevant
major
categories
for
analysis.
The coding
scheme to be used in this analysis was adopted from BlumKulka and Olshtain's research on Cross-Cultural Speech
Act Realization Patterns (CCSARP) in 1984.
3.5.2 Requests
3.5.2.1 Units of Analysis
The utterance or sequence of utterances supplied by
the
subjects
in
responding
to
the
situations
were
examined by dividing them into parts to decide whether
all of their parts were of equal importance or served
equal functions in realizing the speech act aimed at.
In the procedure,
each sequence was analyzed into the
following segments:
(c) post-adjunct.
the
utterance(s)
(a) pre-adjunct;
(b) head act and
The segmentation was meant to delimit
that
constitute
the
nucleus
of
the
speech act (the head act), i.e. that part of the sequence
which might serve to realize the act independently of
other
elements.
In the
following
example
the three
33
segments are illustrated with (A), (B) and (C):
A
B
(3) Sir/ could you give an extension for finishing
my seminar
C
paper/ I haven't finished it yet.
The sequence in this example would be divided into three
parts:
A: Pre-adjunct: "sir"
B: Head act: "could you..."
C: Post-adjunct: "I haven't..."
3.5.2.2 Directness in Requests
On theoretical grounds, there seem to be three major
levels
of
directness
that
can
be
expected
to
be
manifested universally by requesting strategies (BlumKulka and Olstain, 1984, p.201).
a.
the most
direct,
explicit
level
such
as
level
such
as
("Could
you
do
imperatives and performatives.
b.
indirect
the conventionally
speech
acts
indirect
(Searle,
1975)
it...?").
c. nonconventional indirect level such as an openended
group
of
indirect
strategies
intended
to be
requests ("why is the window open?")
These three levels are subdivided into nine distinct
strategy
types
indirectness.
that
together
form
a
scale
of
The categories on this scale are suggested
34
to be manifested in all languages studies (Blum-Kulka and
Olshtain, 1984).
The distribution of strategies on the
scale is meant to yield the relative degree of directness
in making requests in any given language, as compared to
another, in the same situation. The nine strategy types
are as follows:
(1) Strategies at the most indirect level
a) mood derivable
b) explicit performatives
c) hedged performatives
(2) Strategies at the conventionally indirect
level
a) locution derivable
b) scope stating
c) language specific suggestory formula
d) reference to preparatory conditions
(3) Strategies at the nonconventional indirect
level
a) strong hints
b) mild hints
(These nine strategy types are described
in detail in Chapter IV)
3.5.3 Apologies
3.5.3.1 Units of Analysis for Apologies
The units used for analysis were based on Cohen's
and Olshtain's (1981) modification of Fraser's (qtd. in
Cohen
and
Olshtain,
1986)
list
of
semantic
formulas
35
associated with the speech act of apologizing.
modification
consists
of
two basic
semantic
The
formulas
which are further divided into subgroups:
(1) An expression of apology
a) an expression of regret (e.g., "I am
sorry")
b)
an
offer
of
apology
(e.g.,
"I
apologize")
c) a request for forgiveness
(e.g.,
"Excuse
me" or "forgive me")
d) an expression of an excuse;
This includes
not
excuse
an
overt
apology
but
an
which
serves as an apology (e.g, "I know I have done
a big fault" [sic].)
(2) An acknowledgement of responsibility
a)
self
trait
of
deficiency:
Speaker
self-deficiency
expresses
thereby
accepting
responsibility ■(e .g ., "I'm so forgetful")
b)
explicit
self-blame:
Speaker
explicitly blames himself for the offence
(e.g., "It's my fault").
c) denial of fault: Speaker rejects the
need
to apologize
(e.g.,
"It's not my
fault that it fell down").
d)
explanation
or
account
of
the
cause:
Speaker explicitly or implicitly explains
the reason for the cause (explicit, e.g..
36
"The
bus
was
late":
implicit,
"Traffic is always so
e.g.,
heavy").
e) an offer of repair: Speaker offers
repairmen! for the offence or fault s/he
caused (e.g., "I'll go and change it at
once").
f) promise of forbearance: Speaker promises
that
it will
won't
not happen again
(e.g.,
"This
happen again").
These groups include potential strategies and the
selection
(IFID)
of an
(Searle,
apologizing.
Illocutinary Force
1969, p.62)
Focusing
on
Indicating
Device
for performing the act of
these
apology
speech
act
behaviors, the general procedure for coding apologies is
based on a series of independent, dichotomous questions:
(a) does the utterance in question contain an (IFID)?
(b) does it contain an explanation? (c) does it express
the
speaker's
responsibility?
(d)
does
it convey
an
offer of repair? etc.
3.6 Conclusion
The coding scheme proposed for the analysis of the
data provides a measure of objectivity thereby enhancing
universal
applicability
of
the
results.
One
of
the
central issues in the study of speech acts in general is
the
question
of comparability:
to what
extent
is
it
possible to put the English and Turkish patterns into
the same categories and,
in which categories do they
37
bear
the
same
or
similar characteristics?
From the
patterns that do not fall into the same categories, the
differences between two languages will be interpreted as
potential reasons for interference or influence on L2
production.
Those which fall into the same categories
consistently with each other will be examined in terms
of transfer - whether they lead to
not.
positive transfer or
Finally, the patterns that do not fall into any of
these groups will be considered a separate category and
examined in the data analysis chapter.
CHAPTER IV
TURKISH BASELINE DATA
4.1 REQUESTS
4.1.1 Introduction to Analytical Procedures
4.1.1.1 Coding Scheme
In the analytic procedure of the data elicited from
Turkish students, responses to requests will be evaluated
according to a number of dimensions presented in the form
of a coding scheme (Blum-Kulka and Olshtain, 1984).
The
coding scheme consists of two main categories: (1) units
of analysis, and (2) directness in requests.
In the units of analysis, the utterances or sequence
of utterances supplied by the subjects in responding to
the
situations
were
examined
by
dividing
them
into
segments in order to decide whether all of their parts
were of equal importance or served equal functions in
realizing the speech act aimed at.
Each sequence was
analyzed into the following segments:
(a) pre-adjunct,
(b) head act and (c) post-adjunct.
Directness in requests was evaluated in terms of
three major directness levels adopted from Blum-Kulka's
and
Olshtain's
Realization
(1984)
Patterns.
Cross
The
Cultural
three
major
Speech
levels
Act
are
subdivided into nine formulas in terms of strategy type
as follows (proposed by Blum-Kulka and Olshtain (1984)
on the basis of Austin's
(1962),
Searle's
(1975)
and
Fraser's (qtd. in Cohen and Olshtain, 1986) analysis and
theories):
40
(1) The Most Direct Level: Explicit level, realized
by
requests
syntactically
marked
as
such,
such
as
imperatives or by other verbal means that name the act
as a request, such as performatives (Austin, 1962) and
"hedged performatives" (Fraser, 1975). Strategies named
by
utterances
are:
a)
mood
derivable,
b)
explicit
performatives, c) hedged performatives.
(2) The Conventionally Indirect Level.
the
act
by
reference
to
contextual
They realize
preconditions
necessary for its performance, as conventionalized in a
given language (these strategies are commonly referred
to
in speech
act
literature
indirect speech acts,
since
Searle
(1975),
as
as in "could you..." Strategies
that are named by utterances are: a) locution derivable,
b)
scope
stating,
c)
language
specific
suggestory
formula, d) reference to preparatory conditions.
(3) The Nonconventional Indirect Level.
The open-
ended group of indirect strategies (hints) that realize
the request by either partial reference to an object or
element needed for the implementation of the act ("why
is the window open?"), or by reliance on contextual clues
("it is cold in here"). Strategies named by utterances
are: a) strong hints, b) mild hints.
Since English and Turkish patterns seem to fall into
similar categories
at these nine
strategy types,
the
distribution of responses in the request data will be
exemplified
in terms
of these
nine
strategy types.
41
4.1.1.2 Calculations
Percentages are the number of students who used a
particular
strategy
divided
by
the
total
number
subjects taking the questionnaire which is 22.
of
In other
words, if 16 students used an opener in situation 6, the
percentage is calculated by dividing 16 by 22, e.g. 72%.
The 20 tables are presented through the text.
These
tables indicate the percentage of students in relation
to the units or strategies, for example, explanations as
pre-adjuncts, they used per situation.
students used an opener in RS3S
For example, 10
(Request Situation
3
Superior) which elicits a request from a secretary to a
boss.
Later the number of these students was counted and
was converted into a percentage (45%) in order to provide
consistent comparison with the other results.
The
initials
situations.
For
used
in
example,
the
RSIS
text
describe
stands
for
the
Request
Situation 1 Superiors which elicits a request from an
inferior
Situation
to
a
superior.
RS5I
stands
for
Request
5 Inferiors which elicits a request from a
superior to an inferior.
4.1.2
The Presentation of Overall Turkish Data
Specific data is discussed below.
But in general,
in the Turkish request data, it was found that Turkish
speakers use pre-adjuncts, head acts and post-adjuncts
in a large variety.
But the most typical structure would
be, at the most specific level, pre-adjuncts occuring in
42
eight different subcategories (Figure 4.1) at the rate
of 71%.
Head acts were found to occur in all possible
combinations after a pre-adjunct, before a post-adjunct,
between
a
pre-adjunct
and
a
post-adjunct
and
in
isolation. The rate of occurrence of head acts alone is
10%.
Post-adjuncts were found quite rare in general,
occurring
at
the
rate
of
11%.
They
occurred
explanations to head acts as "teşekkür ederim"
as
(thank
you) and "özür dilerim" (I am sorry).
Figure 4.1
(in numbers and percents)
Pre-adjunct
Head Act
Q .
'O
N
124
N
17
71
Post-adjunct
%
10
N
Q .
•o
19
11
In terms of directness, Turkish students tend to be
conventionally indirect in their requests.
The most used
strategy is the reference to preparatory conditions which
contain utterances like "could you...",
"can you...",
"would you..." or "may I..." This strategy occurred at
the rate of 55%.
The strategies at the nonconventional
indirect level were found very rarely. For example, mild
hints
that
directly
make
but
are
no
reference
to
interpretable
the
from
request
the
itself
utterance
occurred only once among all situations, in RS6I, at the
43
rate of 4% (see table 4.5).
Social
eliciting
distance
the
was
request
one
of
patterns
the
variables
in Turkish.
In
in
the
questionnaire, RSs 1,2, 3 and 4 were addressed to social
superiors while RSs
social inferiors.
students
used
5, 6,
7 and 8 were
addressed to
In terms of social distance, Turkish
more
openers
addressing social superiors.
and
address
terms
For example,
when
47% of the
openers were addressed to superiors while 22% of them
were addressed to inferiors.
Also, more address terms
(22%) were used for superiors than inferiors (10%) (table
4.2).
All patterns of "affedersiniz" and "özür dilerim"
found in the request data were addressed to superiors.
"Please" as pre-adjunct occurred for inferiors at the
rate of 10% and only 1% for superiors.
pre-
and
post-adjuncts
and
head
Explanations as
acts
in
isolation
occurred almost equally for superiors and inferiors.
In
using directness strategies, Turkish usage elicited more
imperatives for inferiors at the rate of 13% than for
superiors which occurred at the rate of
5%.
Twelve
percent of the hedge performatives and 13% of explicit
performatives were used for superiors while 1% of the
former and
3% of
the
latter occurred
for
inferiors.
There was no big difference in terms of social distance
in the use of other strategies.
4.1.3 Units of Analysis
44
In the following section the units of analysis will
be presented with typical examples and frequencies.
4.1.3.1 Pre-adjuncts
Pre-adjunct
refers
to
the
first
segment
of
the
utterance if it is any segment other than the main speech
act, the request, such as "I know that you are busy..."
The data presented below is based on 176 situations (8
situations
adjuncts,
openers
occurred
X
22 subjects).
explanations
and
at
address
the
Of the four types of pre
(reason),
terms,
rate
of
explanations
explanations
40%,
explanations
(other),
(reason)
(other)
occurred 13% of the time, openers appeared at the rate
of
32% and address
terms were used 16%.
(Table 4.1)
Because some subjects used two or three pre-adjuncts, the
total use of pre-adjuncts is greater than 176. "Please"
as pre-adjunct occurred at
45
TABLE : 4.1
Pre-adjuacts. Turkish Baseline
N = 22
Number and
Percent Distribution
S I T U A T I O N
SUPERIOR
INFERIOR
Pre-adjunct
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
Average
for all
situations
N
10
5
10
13
1
5
9
5
%
45
22
45
59
4
22
40
22
N
9
2
9
7
2
29
%
40
9
40
31
9
16
N
12
9
12
9
9
12
3
6
72
%
54
40
54
40
40
54
13
27
40
N
9
2
1
4
8
24
%
40
9
4
18
36
13
53
Openers
OO
Address term
Explanation
(reason)
Explanation
(other)
N
1
1
5
2
2
11
%
4
4
22
9
9
6
" Please
46
TABLE : 4.2
Pre-adjuncts. Turkish Baseline
N = 22
Number and
S I T U A T I 0 1N
SUPERIOR
INFERIOR
Pre-adjunct
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
Average
for all
situations
N
1
6
2
9
%
4
27
9
5
N
2
2
1
5
%
9
9
4
2.8
N
1
1
1
3
%
4
4
4
1.5
"Affedersiniz"
0
P "özür Dilerim"
E
N
E
R "Kusura
Bakmayın"
N
3
1
4
%
13
4
2
" iyi günler
A
D
D
R
E
S
S
T
E
R
M
N
2
7
2
11
%
9
31
9
6
Name / Title
N
9
9
18
%
40
40
10
Hocam
N
1
1
5
2
2
11
%
4
4
22
9
9
6
Lütfen
Explanation
(reason)
Explanation
(other)
N
12
9
12
9
9
12
3
6
72
%
54
40
54
40
40
54
13
27
40
N
9
2
1
4
8
24
%
40
9
4
18
36
13.0
47
the rate of 6%.
Explanations (reasons) were used fairly consistently
across all eight situations (Table 4.1), but were used
most often in situations 1, 3 and 6 that elicit requests
both to superiors and inferiors.
For example, in RS3S
students used explanations at the rate of 58%.
(1)
RS3S
Çok
önemli
ayrılabilirmiyim?
bir
işim
var.
Erken
(I have important business. May
I leave early?).
The next most common pre-adjunct, openers is used
primarily in RSsS 1 and 3 when the speaker addresses a
social superior.
"For example,
"affedersiniz" (excuse
me) is the most used opener in RS3S
when addressing a
social superior at the rate of 27%. (Table 4.1)
(2)
RS3S Affedersiniz,
saat
17'de benim
için...
(Excuse me, I have something...).
Other openers found in the responses are "özür dilerim"
(I am sorry) "kusura bakmayın" (I hope you don't mind)
"iyi günler" (good afternoon).
"Please" as pre-adjunct occurred most often in RS6I
in which the speaker addressed an inferior.
never
appeared
Typically,
in
RSs
1,
3 and
5
(see
"Please"
Table
4.1).
"please" occurred in RSs eliciting requests
addressed to inferiors.
In Turkish "please" emphasizes
the obligation of the hearer to do the act depending on
the situation.
Furthermore "please" usually requires an
imperative. For example.
48
(3) RS6I Lütfen
çabuk olun uçağa
geç kalıyorum.
(Please hurry. I'm late for the plane).
Address terms were among the least used,
they are very situation specific.
because
For example, "hocam"
(a term used when addressing teachers) occurred at the
rate of 10% and only in RSsS 1 and 4,
both situations
in which the speaker addresses a teacher.
(4) RSIS Hocam, rica etsem ödevimi...(Hocam,
if I request...).
Another typical usage was supplied in the form of
a name and title together especially in RS7I.
That is,
Turkish usage allows for special titles for particular
situations and persons,
the most common being "(name)
efendi"
for
doorman).
(a
title
used
social
inferiors
like
a
Thirty-one percent of the subjects tended to
use this form in RS7I when addressing a doorman and it
was never used in other RSs,
(5) RS7I Ali efendi sigara almayı unutmuşum...
(Ali efendi I have forgotten to buy...)
4.1.3.2 Head Act
The head act is the main speech act in a request.
It would be the request
itself
like
"Bana bir paket
sigara alabilirmisiniz?" (Could you buy me a packet of
49
TABUS ; 4.3
Head Acts. Turkisb Baseline
N = 22
Number and Percent Distribution
S IT U A T I0 N
SUPERIOR
INFERIOR
8
Average
for all
situations
9
14
83
40
40
63
46
1
3
1
1
8
4
13
4
4
4
Head-act
N
After
Pre-adjimct
%
N
Before
Pre-adjunct
%
1
2
3
4
11
10
13
10
7
9
50
45
59
45
31
1
1
4
4
5
6
7
N
Between
Pre and post
%
adjunct
2
2
2
1
4
3
1
15
9
9
9
4
18
13
4
8
N
4
5
3
1
5
1
20
%
18
22
13
4
22
4
10
in isolation
50
cigarettes?).
The most used head acts patterns found in
the request data are "can you do it?,"
"could you do
it?," "would you do it?" and "may I do it?"
were examined,
variables
adjunct,
in
on the basis of the responses,
terms
of
occurrence;
(1)
(2) before a post-adjunct,
the head acts
occurred after an
adjunct (see Table 4.3).
in four
after
a pre
(3) between a pre
and post-adjunct and (4) in isolation.
of
Head acts
In all RSs 46%
explanation pre
For example in RS8I in which
a superior (boss) is to request an inferior (secretary)
to type two letters soon, 63% of the responses involved
head acts after a pre-adjunct.
(6)
RS8I
gerekiyor,
Çok
önemli
bunlar
hemen
göndermem
ilk önce bunları yazarmısınız?
(These
are very important. I need to send them soon. Can
you type them?).
In this situation the speaker believes that s/he imposes
on the hearer
by making a request.
specifically from the explanation of
This
may arise
"you are asking
your secretary to type them in an hour and she has other
work to do" given in this situation (see Appendix A).
4.1.3.3 Post-adjuncts
Post-adjuncts
are
the
segments
head acts usually as explanations.
that occur
after
They did not occur
as often as pre-adjuncts in the request data.
For
51
TABLE : 4.4
Post-adjuncts. Turkish Baseline
N = 22
S IT U A T I0 N
SUPERIOR
INFERIOR
Post-adj
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
Average
for all
situations
N
2
2
4
1
4
3
1
%
9
9
18
4
18
13
4
9.4
N
1
1
2
%
4
4
1
17
Explanation
"Teşekkür
Ederim"
N
1
1
%
4
0.5
"özür Dilerim"
N
1
1
1
3
%
4
4
4
1.5
" Lütfen
52
example the highest rate of occurrence of post-adjuncts
was in RSs 4 and 6 (18% for each).
(7) RS7I
...almayı unutmuşumda (...I've forgotten
to buy)
"Teşekkür ederim"
(thank you) and "özür dilerim" (I am
sorry) also occurred as post-adjuncts but at very low
rate 1% and 0.5% (table 4.4).
(8) RS5I Elimizde olmayan sebeplerden dolayı senin
dersini bir hafta önceye alıyorum, özür dilerim. (I
am
scheduling
your
presentation
a
week
earlier
because of reasons beyond our control. I'm sorry).
Clearly, in these data post-adjuncts are not typical in
Turkish requests.
4.1.4 Directness in Requests
The data were analyzed in terms of the three levels
of
directness
(see
Table
4.5).
Of
these,
the
conventionally indirect was the most typical level in
the data, occurring in 17% of the 176 situations.
The
most used strategy type at this level was reference to
preparatory conditions which occurred at the rate of
47%.
The most direct level strategies were infrequent.
For example,
9%.
imperatives occurred only at the rate of
Nonconventional indirect level strategies occurred
at the rates of 1% and 0.5%.
(Table 4.5)
The typical
choices for each category are presented below.
TABLE : 4.5
Directness in Requests Turkish Baseline
N = 22
S IT UA T I0 N
SUPERIOR
INFERIOR
Average
Strategy
■p/^y> d±J.
all
' JLUI
2
1
3
4
5
6
7
8
situations
N
5
6
2
4
17
%
22
27
9
18
9
Imperatives
Explicit
N
Performatives
%
8
4
36
18
13
1
4
7
N
Hedged
Performatives
%
2
4
1
4
3
14
9
18
4
18
13
7
N
1
4
4
1
7
17
%
4
18
18
4
31
9
N
3
7
2
2
3
17
%
13
31
9
9
13
9
Language Spec. N
Suggestory
Formula
%
1
5
4
1
11
4
22
18
4
6
14
13
14
4
6
9
16
9
85
63
59
63
18
27
40
72
40
47
Locution
Derivable
Scope Stating
Reference to N
Preparatory
%
Conditions
N
2
1
3
%
9
4
1.5
Strong hints
N
1
1
%
4
0.5
Mild hints
54
4.1.4.1 Strategies at the most direct level
Imperatives in which the grammatical mood of the verb in
the
utterance
marks
its
illocutionary
force
as
a
request, occurred at the rate of 9% in the request data.
In Turkish two types of imperatives exist in terms of
formality:
(1) formal, with the suffix of second person
plural as in the "yaz-in" type, and (2) informal, with
the simple form of the verb, the "yaz" type.
data
showed
that
when
addressing
Request
inferiors
students
tended to use informal imperatives, especially in RSsI
6, 7 and 8 while formal imperatives were used only once
when addressing an inferior in RS8I.
(9)
RS8I
Diğer
işlerini
bırak
ve
hemen
şu
iki
mektubu yaz. (Stop doing all the other work you are
doing and type these two letters soon.)
A distinctive feature of Turkish usage found only
in RS4S led us to form a distinct category different
from
imperatives:
the phrase
"buyrun"
(here
in the
meaning of "sit here please") which can be used with a
formal imperative making the request much more polite
than a simple imperative.
occur with
This form was also found to
"lütfen" adding to the utterance a polite
meaning as an interrogative indirect request.
But this
form is one of the least used imperatives since it is
very situation specific occurring only in RS4S.
(10)
RS4S
Buyrun
lütfen
(Please sit in this chair.)
şu
koltuğa
oturun...
55
Explicit performatives in which the illocutionary
force
of
the
utterance
speaker occurred
in RSs
is
explicitly
2,
3 and
named
5 when
by
the
addressing
either superiors or inferiors at the rate of 7%. (Table
4.5)
In RS2S where an inferior (student) is addressing
a request to a superior (manager) the situation itself
allows explicit performatives
(11) RS2S Gazetede çıkan iş ilani için arıyorum. (I
am calling for the job I saw in the paper).
Hedged performatives, utterances embedding the naming of
the illocutionary force, did not occur frequently in the
request data.
They occurred only in RSsS 2 and 4, when
addressing superiors at the rates of 7%. (Table 4.5)
(12) RS2S
. . .İ Ş
istiyordum
hakkında daha detaylı bilgi almak
(I’d
like
to
get
more
detailed
information about the job.)
4.1.4.2 Strategies at the Conventionally Indirect Level
In locution derivable strategies the illocutionary
point is directly derivable from the semantic meaning of
the locution.
where
This strategy occurred mostly in RS8I
a boss
asked
a secretary
to type
two
letters
immediately.
The rate of occurrence is 31% in this RS.
(Table 4.5)
The following is a typical example of a
locution derivable from RS5I where a teacher is to ask
a student to present his/her lesson a week earlier.
(13)
RS5I
Gelecek
haftaki
dersin
bu
hafta
anlatılması gerekli (Next week's class needs
56
to be presented this week.)
In the example above, the speaker indirectly states the
illocutionary point which is derived from the locution.
Scope
stating
utterances
express
the
speaker's
intentions, desires or feelings about the fact that the
hearer should do X.
(14)
RS2S
For example:
ilanınızı
okudum.
Bu
işle
ilgileniyorum (I read your advertisement. I am
interested in this job.)
In RS2S, when addressing a superior 31% of the students
used
thescope
stating
strategy
(Table
4.5).
It
occurred rarely in the other situations.
Inlanguage
sentence
specific
suggestory
contains a suggestion
formulas,
to the hearer.
the
Some
typical examples of Turkish suggestory formulas are as
follows:
(The
idioms
discussed here are particularly
difficult to translate into English.
The content could
be translated from one language into another but the
usage could not.
There was not an exact correspondence
between the usage in the two languages.)
(15)
RS2S
Gazetedeki
ilan
ediyordum].
( [I know that
you]
the
about
için
[rahatsız
I am disturbing
advertisement
I saw
in the
paper.)
(16)
RSIS
[Rica
etsem]
süreyi
uzatabilirmisiniz. ([If I request that] could
you give me an extension?)
57
(17)
RS3S
Ne
kadar
meşgul
olduğunuzu
biliyorum, ama 5 'ten önce ayrılmam gerekiyor.
[Mümkün mü?]
(I know how busy you are, but I
need to leave before 5 pm. [Is it possible?])
(18) RS4S [Zahmet olacak] ama bir paket sigara
alabilirmisin? ([I know I am causing you a lot
of trouble] but could you buy me a...)
(19)
RS4S
[Zahmet
olmazsa]
bana
bir
paket
sigara alırmısın? ([If it won't get you into
trouble]
can
you
buy
me
a
packet
of
cigarettes?)
It was found that Turkish allows for a great range
of language specific suggestory formulas in requests.
For example, "rahatsız ediyorum" (I know I am disturbing
you) was found at the rate of 22% in RS2S (addressed to
a superior), and "sana zahmet olacak" (it will cause you
a lot of trouble) was supplied in RS7 (addressed to an
inferior) at the rate of 18%. (Table 4.5)
On the basis
of these data, we can conclude that "rahatsiz ediyorum"
is more often used when addressing superiors, and "sana
zahmet olacak" is used when addressing inferiors.
The reference to Preparatory Conditions
strategy
was the most used strategy and occurred at the rate of
47% in all RSs. For example in RS7I it was used at the
rate
of
72%,
(the most
frequent),
while
in RS4S
it
occurred at the rate of 18% (the least). RS7I requires
a request
to
an
inferior
(doorman),
so most
of
the
58
subjects
prefer
to
use
addressing a doorman.
because
18%
of
an
indirect
(Table
students
4.5)
gave
speech
RS4S
no
act when
is peculiar
answer
for
the
situation.
(20)
RS7I
Lütfen
bana
bir
paket
sigara
alırmısınız? (Please could you buy me a packet
of cigarettes?)
(21) RS4S ...Bir başka koltuğa geçermisiniz?
(Could you take another seat?)
4.1.4.3 Strategies at the Nonconventional Indirect Level
Strong hints strategies were found very similar to
locution
derivables
illocutionary
point
(explained
is
in 4.1.4.2)
directly
where
the
from
the
derivable
semantic meaning of the locution. In strong hints where
the utterance contains partial reference to objects or
elements needed for the implementation of the act, the
illocutionary
point
can
also
be
semantic meaning of the locution.
may
also
contain
partial
derived
from
the
A locution derivable
reference
to
objects
or
elements needed for the implementation. For example in
(22)
RS3S
zamanında
...Çok
önemli
orda olmam
bir
randevum
gerekiyor.
var,
(I have
an
important appointment, I have to be there on
time.),
the utterance contains both a partial reference to the
element that is needed for the implementation of the act
of
"leaving
early,"
(being
there
"ayrılmam")
and
a
59
directly derivable
illocutionary point,
intention
of leaving early"
important
appointment),
that
is "the
(çok önemli bir randevu;
derivable
from
the
semantic
meaning of the locution that is the utterance itself.
Those
two
strategies
will
be
regarded
as
mutually
exclusive for these particular data.
Only one example of mild hints could be found, in
all of the situations, in RS6I where the utterance of
(23)
RS6I Uçağım saat 9' da kalkacak. Yetişme
şansımız nedir? (My flight is at 9 pm. What is
our chance of catching it?)
makes
no
reference
to
the
request
proper
but
interpretable through the context as a request.
is
The
rate of occurrence of this type in RS6I is 4% (table
4.5) .
4.1.5 Results and Summary
Analysis of the data showed that explanations as
pre-adjuncts occurred at a very high rate in all RSs.
Explaining the reason(s) for the request before stating
the main
speech act
(request)
can be
said to be an
outstanding characteristic of Turkish usage.
Other than
reasons, explanations occurred as the stating of doubts
about
whether
the
performing
trouble to the requestee.
of
request
will
give
For example, utterances like
"I know I am disturbing you but could you...?" and "if
it doesn't give you trouble..." or "it will cause you a
lot of trouble but..." occurred as pre-adjuncts in the
60
request data.
request
as
The use of apologetic formulas before the
pre-adjuncts
was
also
found
frequently
especially in RS3S.
Other
variables
than
of
especially
explanations,
pre-adjuncts
in
requests
to
strategies
occur
in
a
superiors.
in
large
using
variety
Twenty-seven
percent of the responses involved these variables. For
example, in terms of pre-adjuncts, six different types
of
variables
were
found
addressing superiors.
to
occur
especially
when
The use of "affedersiniz" (excuse
me) and "özür dilerim" (I am sorry) can be considered as
distinctive opener types when starting a request to a
superior, occurring at the rates of 5% and 2%.
"Hocam" (a term used when addressing teachers) as
ah address term was found to occur very often but in a
limited number of
situations;
more than half
of the
subjects used it in the RSs 1 and 4 when addressing a
teacher.
The frequent
situations
that
use of
addressed
"hocam"
teachers
in
in almost all
face
to
face
communication in Türkiye seems to be reflected in the
responses.
Use of a name of a person was found only in RS7I
when addressing a doorman occurring there at the rate of
31%.
In all of these occurrences,
with
a
special
situation.
term,
"efendi,"
it was accompanied
typical
to
that
61
Use of "lütfen"
(please) was interestingly found
only in the RSs addressed to inferiors and very rare to
superiors.
This can be interpreted as Turkish students'
tendency to be careful about the delicacy of the social
distance
that
might
offend
the
hearer
in
requests
addressed to inferiors. This interpretation applies for
only RSsI
7 and 8.
In Turkish,
if the requestee
is
socially inferior, the requestor usually has a tendency
not to utter the request in a direct form such as an
imperative.
"please"
Another
for
interpretation
inferiors
can
be
of
the
its
use
of
obligatory
illocutionary force on the hearer which has a negative
effect on the hearer.
For example, in the utterance
(24) RS6I Lütfen acele edin. (Please hurry up).
The speaker indicates that the hearer should do the act.
This interpretation applies for only RS6 in which the
speaker
is considered
to have
a right
to state
the
illocutionary force in a way that the hearer should do
the act.
Although
occurring
very
rarely,
post-adjuncts
usually were explanations (9%).
Turkish
indirect
students
seem
to
prefer
conventional
strategies especially when addressing social
superiors.
The
strategy
most
commonly
used
at
the
conventional indirect level is reference to preparatory
conditions
occurring in all RSs at the rate of 47%.
These utterances,
when they occurred,
contained forms
62
like "could you buy..." or "is it possible to do..." or
"would you please do..." in the request data.
Interestingly,
imperatives occurred only in three
of the four situations addressed to inferiors and even
there at a very low rate, an avarage of 9% and in RS4S
addressed to a superior at the rate of 22%.
The highest
rate of occurrence of imperatives was in RS6I addressed
to a taxi driver, at 27%.
Nonconventional indirect level strategies were not
much used ones; they occurred only in RSsI 5, 6 and 8
addressed to inferiors. For example, the utterances that
made
no
reference
to
the
request
proper
but
was
interpretable through the context as a request occurred
in RS6I, a rate of 4%.
4.2 APOLOGIES
4.2,1
Introduction to Semantic Formulas
The analytical procedure in this section will be
based
on
a
set
of
semantic
formulas.
The
list
of
semantic formulas associated with the apology speech act
was
adopted
from
Blum-Kulka's
and
Olshtain's
(1984)
Cross Cultural Speech Act Realization Patterns study and
Cohen's and Olshtain's
(1981)
study of apology.
The
list consists of the following categories:
(1) An expression of apology
a) An expression of regret (e.g., "üzgünüm" (I
am sorry) and "mahcubum" (I'm ashamed)).
63
b) An offer of apology (e.g., "özür dilerim"
(I apologize)).
c)
A
request
"affedersiniz"
for
(excuse
forgiveness
me)
or
(e.g.,
"bağışlayın"
(forgive me) or "kusura bakmayın (I hope you
don't mind)).
d) An expression of an excuse (not an overt
apology
but
an
excuse
which
serves
as
an
apology).
(2) An acknowledgement of responsibility
a)
Self-deficiency:
trait
of
Speaker
self-deficiency
expresses
thereby
the
accepting
responsibility.
b)
Self-blame:
Speaker
explicitly
blames
himself for the offense.
c) Denial of Fault: Speaker rejects the need
to apologize.
d) Explanation or account of cause:
Speaker
explicitly or implicitly explains the reason
for the cause.
e) Offer of repair: Speaker offers repairment
for the offense or the fault he caused.
f) Promise of forbearance:
Speaker promises
that the fault will not reoccur.
In the light of this categorization, responses will
be analyzed
to answers
for
questions
like
"does
the
utterance in question contain an expression of apology,"
64
"does it contain an explanation?" etc.
The
initials
descriptions
of
used
the
in
the
text
situations.
represent
For
example,
the
AS9S
stands for Apology Situation 9 Superiors which elicits
an apology from an inferior to a superior while AS13I
stands for Apology Situation 13 Inferiors which elicits
an apology from a soperior to an inferior.
4.2.2 The Overall Presentation of Data
Specific data is discussed below.
But in general
apologetic formulas were by far the most commonly used,
occurring in a large variety in the apology data. An
expression of apology was found in six different forms;
"üzgünüm" (I'm sorry),
dilerim"
"mahcubum" (I'm ashamed),
(I apologize),
"affedersiniz"
"özür
(excuse me),
"bağışlayın" (forgive me) and "kusura bakmayın" (I hope
you don't mind).
varied.
However, the range of use was quite
The most used formula was "özür dilerim" which
occurred
at
the
"Kusura
bakmayın"
especially
when
inferiors,
but
"Affedersiniz"
rate
of
was
32%
in
also
a
addressing
at
the
an
much
(excuse me) was
while "mahcubum"
the
apology
frequent
apology
lower
used
11%
formula,
to
rate
of
data.
social
of
8%.
the time
(a strong expression of apology like
"I'm embarrassed") occurred only once for a rate of 4%,
in AS13I
a situation which required an apology to a
customer because of serving the wrong order.
65
Strategies taking responsibility for the fault or
offence occurred infrequently.
repair
for
the
cause
was
The strategy of offering
the
most
occurring at an avarage rate of 25%.
used
strategy
(Table 4.7)
Self
deficiency, one of the less used, occurred in ASs 9, 10
and 13, but at the rate of 72% in AS13I where a superior
is to apologize for forgetting to pay the fare to a taxi
driver.
The
determining
strategy type,
in general,
itself
rather
than
the
factor
in
choosing
this
seems to be the situation
social
distance
between
the
variables
in
speaker and the hearer.
Social
distance
was
one
of
the
eliciting Turkish apology patterns.
ASs 9, 10, 11 and
12 were addressed to social superiors while 13, 14, 15
and 16 were addressed social inferiors (see Appendix A).
In
expressing
an apology,
formula "ozur dilerim"
Turkish
students
(I apologize)
used
the
for superiors at
the rate of 45% while they used 20% of this pattern for
inferiors.
"Bağışlayın'
They used 3% of
mind)
using
was used only for superiors.
"kusura bakmayın"
(I hope you don't
for superiors and 14% of it for inferiors.
acknowledgement
of
responsibility
In
strategies,
Turkish students used self-deficiency and explicit self
blame patterns for inferiors more than for superiors.
For example,
blame
they supplied 20% of the explicit self-
strategies
superiors.
for
All examples
inferiors
and
only
3%
for
of denial of fault strategy
66
occurred in the data were used for inferiors while all
of
promise
of
forbearance
patterns
were
used
for
superiors.
4.2.3 An Expression of ApologyIn this group, four ways in which one can perform
an
apology
Calculated
will
be
applied
frequencies
and
to
the
typical
Turkish
examples
data.
will
be
presented in the following section.
4.2.3.1 An Expression of Regret
The Turkish data showed that Turkish usage allows
for two types of expressions of regret in apologies; (1)
"üzgünüm" (I'm sorry) and (2) "mahcubum" (I'm ashamed)
which expresses a deeper regret from the fault. Yet, the
former occurred equally in ASs addressing superiors and
inferiors while the latter occurred only in AS13 at the
rate
of
4%.
(Table
4.6)
An
example
of
the
use
of
"üzgünüm" can be found in AslOS where it occurs at the
rate of 22%.
(25) ASIOS Çok üzgünüm.
(I'm sorry.)
4.2.3.2 An Offer of Apology
"özür dilerim" (I apologize) occurred very often in
the
apology
inferior
data.
For
(waiter)
is
instance,
to
in AS12S
apologize
to
a
where
an
superior
(customer), it occurred at the rate of 63%, the most in
all the ASs it occurred in.
(26)
AS12S
kalabalık
Çok
...(I
özür
dilerim,
bugün
apologize very much,
çok
it is
67
TABLE : 4.6
An Expression of Apology. Turkish Baseline
N = 22
S IT U A T I0N
SUPERIOR
INFERIOR
Average
Apology
■Ç
Г О Г *
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
- s i l
a L İ .X
16 situations
N
5
2
3
10
%
22
9
13
5
" Üzgiinüm
N
1
1
%
4
0.5
" Mahcubum
N
4
11
11
14
7
4
5
2
58
%
18
50
50
63
31
18
22
9
32
N
2
2
2
4
4
5
1
20
%
9
9
9
18
18
22
4
11
N
1
1
2
%
4
4
1
N
1
1
1
5
5
2
1
16
%
4
4
4
22
22
9
4
8
N
1
1
1
2
10
15
30
%
4
4
4
9
45
68
11
"özür Dilerim"
"Affedersiniz"
"Bağışlayın"
"Kusura
Bakmayın"
others
68
very crowded today....)
The difference between the occurrence of an offer of
apology to superiors and to inferiors was found
noticeably different in terms of percentage. Average
use to superiors was 22% versus 10% for average use to
inferiors. Turkish students used "özür dilerim" more
often when addressing superiors.
4.2.3.3 A Request for Forgiveness
Turkish usage was found to allow three types of
requests for forgiveness in the apology strategies: (1)
"affedersiniz" (excuse me), (2) "bağışlayın" (forgive
me), and (3) "kusura bakmayın" ( a stronger request for
forgiveness like "I hope you don't mind).
"Affedersiniz" occurred most often in AS14I (at a
rate of 22%) while it did not occur at all in AS15I
which elicits an apology from a teacher to a student.
(Table 4.6)
"Kusura bakmayın" was found as a more frequent form
compared to "bağışlayın". This formula was found to
occur more frequently in ASs addressed to inferiors than
in ASs addressed to superiors.
"Bağışlayın" implying a stronger request for
forgiveness was found only twice in the data in ASsS 9
and 11 at the rate of 4% in each. (Table 4.6)
4.2.3.4 An Expression of an Excuse
In AS15I, 45% of the students supplied utterances
that were not overt apologies but served as apologies.
69
e.g., accepting that they caused the fault or offering
repairment.
(27)
AS15I
Hasan
neyse
öderim.
Hatalı
olan
bendim.(I'll pay for the damage. It was my fault.)
4.2.4 An Acknowledgement of Responsibility
4.2.4.1 Self-deficiency
This strategy type seems to occur most often in
AS13I
(72%)
where
a superior
is
to apologize
to an
inferior because of forgetting to pay the fare.
Other
than AS13I, only ASsS 9 and 10, situations addressed to
superiors, elicited this strategy, but only at the rates
of 13% and 4%. (Table 4.7)
(28) ASIOS ...çok dalgınım bu günlerde.
(...I'm so
absent-minded these days.)
4.2.4.2 Explicit Self-blame
Turkish students used this strategy only in ASs 10
(13%) and 15 (40%).
superior
and
the
The former elicits an apology to a
latter
to an
inferior.
This
type
usually occurred preceding or following an expression of
apology.
(29)
ASIOS
suçumdu.
özür
dilerim.
(I apologize.
Tamamen
benim
It was completely my
fault.)
Both ASs 10 and 15 take place between a teacher and
a student. It is interesting to note that the strategy
of self-blame seems to occur more often in AS15I where
the teacher is apologizing to a student.
70
4.2.4.3 Denial of Fault
Only in AS16I where a boss is to apologize to a
secretary because of a remark interpreted as an insult
by
the
secretary,
did
68%
of
the
subjects
supply
utterances which imply denial of fault.
(30) AS16I Aslında ben o sözü size söylemek
istemedim. Genele konuştum, üstüne alınma. Ben
seni iyi tanırım.
(I really didn't
want to
say that to you. I spoke in general. Don't be
offended. I know you well.)
Another example of denial of fault is as follows
(31) AS16I Affedersiniz ama yanlış anlamışsınız.
(Excuse me but you misunderstood it.)
In the example above,
typically,
the
utterance
is
which was
illocutionary
different
found only in AS16I
force
from
involved
what
in
it
the
says
("affedersiniz"). It involves a rejection of the need to
apologize.
This meaning is often derived from the word
"ama" (but) which serves as an emphasizer to the meaning
rejection as well as from the intonation.
4.2.4.4 Explanation or Account of Cause
This strategy is used most frequently (59%) in AS14
where
a
superior
(manager)
is
to
apologize
to
an
inferior (applicant). (Table 4.7)
(32) AS14I Sizi beklettiğim için çok özür dilerim,
önemli bir iş toplantısı vardı.
keeping you waiting.
(I apologize for
I had an important business
71
TABLE :4.7
An Acknowledgement of Responsibility. Turkish Baiseline
N = 22
S IT UA T I0 N
SUPERIOR
INFERIOR
Strategy
9
N
Self-deficiency
%
Explicit
Self-blame
10
11
12
13
14
15
3
1
16
20
13
4
72
11
N
3
9
12
%
13
40
6
N
Denial of fault
%
Explanation N
or account of
cause
%
An offer of
repair
Promise of
forbearance
Average
for all
16 situations
15
15
68
8
4
11
5
13
33
18
50
22
59
18
N
11
12
7
16
46
%
50
54
31
72
25.8
N
2
1
3
6
%
9
4
13
3
72
meeting.)
In other ASs where this strategy occurred, superiors are
addressed more often than inferiors.
(Table 4.7)
4.2.4.5 An Offer of Repair
This type of strategy occurred in ASs 10, 12, 13
and 15, usually with other types of strategies or
expressions of apology. In AS15I where a teacher bumps
into a student's car and is to apologize, the rate of
occurrence is 72%. (Table 4.7)
(33) AS15I Tamamen benim hatam, özür dilerim.
Masrafı
neyse
karşılamaya
hazırım.
(It was
completely my fault. I apologize. I'm ready to pay
for the expenditure.)
In
this
example
above,
one
apologetic
formula
(özür
dilerim) and two different types of acknowledgement of
responsibility (explicit self-blame and offer of repair)
occurred together.
4.2.4.6 Promise of Forbearance
This
strategy
was
not
found
very
often
in
the
apology data, occurring only at the rate of 3%. (Table
4.7)
(34)
AS9S
Çok
çok
fırsat daha verin.
özür
dilerim.
Bana
bir
(I apologize very much.
Give me one more chance.)
In the example above, the promise of forbearance was not
explicitly expressed by the speaker.
73
Interestingly,
in three of the ASs
addressed to
superiors, 9, 10 and 11, an expression of regret and an
offer
of
apology
were
found
to
occur
together
emphasize the meaning of apologetic formula.
to
An example
of this category is as follows:
(35)
ASIOS
Üzgünüm.
Çok
özür
dilerim.
istemeden
(I apologize very much.
It was
oldu.
not
on
purpose. I'm sorry.)
Apologetic
large
formulas found in Turkish data have a
variety:
"özür
dilerim",
"affedersiniz",
"kusura bakmayın" are the most used ones.
and
For instance,
"özür dilerim" occurred at the rate of 32% in all ASs.
Although "mahcubum" and "bağışlayın" were found to be
typical formulas in Turkish usage,
they did not occur
very often (each at the rate of 1%)
In the apology strategies, subjects did not seem to
use
these
strategies
very
offering for repairment
often.
The
occurred at
strategy
of
the highest rate
among others while promise of forbearance occurred at
the lowest rate.
tend
to
Typically,
apologize
apologize
to
a
in
AS16I
secretary
Turkish students did not
where
a
because
manager
of
a
is
to
remark
misinterpreted by the secretary. (Appendix A) This could
arise
from the
situation
itself
in which
an idea of
misunderstanding was implied in the description of the
situation.
lA
Turkish usage
seems
to allow for more
strategy type in one situation.
11,
than one
For example, in ASs 9,
12 and 15 strategies of explaining the cause and
offer of repair typically occurred together as in
(36) AS12S özür dilerim. Bugün cok kalabalık
karıştırdım.
(I apologize.
Siparişinizi hemen getiriyorum.
It is very crowded today and I
am confused. I'll bring your order soon.)
In AS15I, strategies of explicit self-blame and an offer
of repair occurred together as in
(37) AS15I
...tamamen benim hatam. H a s a n ödemeye
hazırım, (...it was completely my fault. I'm ready
to pay for the damage.)
As a result Turkish students were found to use a
large variety of apologetic
strategies
taking
the
formulas but not so many
responsibility
of
the
cause.
Especially when addressing inferiors they tended to make
explanations
apologize.
about
the
cause
rather
than
explicitly
They usually'tended to make explanations and
offer for repairment at high rates.
CHAPTER V
ENGLISH BASELINE DATA
5.1 REQUESTS
5.1.1 Overall Presentation of the Data
These data represents a quite small sample, so can
only be taken as suggestive rather than definitive.
In
these data English speakers tended to use the pre-adjunct
as the most typical structure at the rate of 70% while
they use head acts in isolation 37% of the time. (Figure
5.1)
as well as the post adjuncts.
They used openers
such as "excuse me," "please" and address terms as pre
adjuncts.
rate of
Explanations as pre-adjuncts occurred at the
45%
in all RSs.
They usually tended to be
potential reasons for the request.
Thirty-seven percent
of the head acts occurred in isolation.
Post-adjuncts
as explanations to head acts occurred at the rate of 33%.
Figure 5.1
(in number and percent)
Pre -adjunct
Head Act
Post-adjunct
N
%
N
Q.
•6
N
123
70
65
37
65
%
37
In terms of directness, English speakers tended to
use the strategies at the level of conventional indirect,
especially
the
strategy
of
reference
to
preparatory
76
conditions
occurring
at
the
rate
of
45%.
Explicit
performatives were also frequent ones occurring at the
rate of 16%.
occurring
Only two imperatives could be found, one
for
inferior.
a
superior
English
and
speakers
one
occurring
did not
for
seem to use
nonconventional indirect level strategies.
an
the
Strong hints
which contain a partial reference to objects or elements
needed for the implementation of the act, and mild hints
that do not make reference to the request proper did not
occur at all in the request data.
American and British patterns found in the request
data differed slightly in terms of sequencing strategies.
Not
so
many
openers,
address
terms
and
explanations
occurred in the British speakers' responses while most
of the openers, address terms and explanations and post
adjuncts were found in the American speakers' responses.
In
the
English
request
data,
adjuncts occurred for superiors.
most
of
the
For example,
the openers (8%) were used for superiors.
pre
all of
"Please" as
pre-adjunct occurred equally for superiors and inferiors.
33% of the head acts in isolation were used for superiors
while 41% of them were used for inferiors.
as
post-adjuncts
inferiors.
occurred
equally
for
Explanations
superiors
and
Similarly directness strategies in English
data occurred almost equally for superiors and inferiors.
For example half (8%) of the imperatives were used for
superiors and the other half for inferiors.
All of the
77
scope stating strategies occurred with inferiors (16%).
Pre-adjuncts occurred as openers like "excuse me,"
address
terms
explanations
such
like
as
"sir,"
"I've
been
a name
very
of
busy
a person
or
finishing my
assignment this semester..." and "please" in the English
data.
"Excuse me" occurred in two of the RSs as pre
adjunct, both addressed to superiors at the rate of 8%.
(1) RS2S Excuse me my name is...
Address terms occurred as the name of a person in RSs 5
and 2 at the rate of 8% both addressing superiors and
inferiors.
(2) RS5I X, would you be able to...
Explanations were the most used strategies occurring
in seven of eight RSs.
The only RS that an explanation
did not occur in as pre-adjunct is RS7I.
In RS2S all the
responses started with an explanation,
at the rate of
100%.
(Table 5.1)
reasons
for
addressed
the
to
Explanations tended to be potential
requests
superiors
in
all
and
RSs.
Explanations
inferiors
occurred
approximately at the same rates, 25% vs 20%.
"Please" as pre-adjunct occurred only in RSs 4 and
6 at the rate of 8%.
(3) RS4S Please, come and sit in the sofa...
78
5.1.2.2 Head Acts
Head acts after pre-adjuncts occurred at the rate
of
45%
in the request data.
This shows
that native
speakers of English frequently start a request with a
pre-adjunct
like
an
opener,
an
address
term,
an
explanation or, rarely, with "please".
Occurring
before
a post-adjunct,
head acts were
found at the rate of 33% in the request data. (Table 5.2)
(4) RS3S I have an important appointment and
have
to
leave
before
5:00
today.
I'll
be
happy to come early tomorrow morning to finish
the work.
Between a pre- and post-adjunct, head acts did not occur
very often, at the rate of 12%.
Head acts in isolation
without taking a pre- or post-adjunct occurred at the
rate of 37%.
(5) RS7I Would
you mind
getting me
a packet of
cigarettes?
Only in RS4S where a student is to ask a teacher not to
sit in his father's favorite chair, were there no head
acts in isolation.
Post-adjuncts
always occurred as explanations
to
head acts, at the rate of 33% in the request data. Only
in RSs 2 and 5 were there no post-adjuncts.
(Table 5.3)
(6) RS4S Please come and sit on the sofa. I think
it's more comfortable.
79
TABLE ; 5.1
Pre-adjuncts. English. Baseline
N = 3
SITUATION
SUPERIOR
INFERIOR
Pre-adj.
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
Average
for all
situations
N
1
1
2
%
33
33
8
N
1
1
2
%
33
33
8
Openers
Explanations
N
3
1
1
2
1
2
11
33 100
33
33
66
33
66
45
1
Address terms
%
N
1
1
2
%
33
33
8
" Please
80
The address term "sir" as post-adjunct occurred in RS3S
at the average rate of 4%.
5.1.3 Directness in Requests
5.1.3.1 Strategies at the Most Direct Level
Imperatives did not occur very often except for the
two RSs 4 and 6 at the rate of 8%. (Table 5.4)
(7) RS6I Please hurry...
Explicit performatives occurred in RS2S at the rate of
66% and were usually addressed to superiors more than
inferiors (12% vs 4%).
(8) RS2S
...I'm calling to learn more about
the job.
Hedged performatives were used only once in RS5I where
it was addressed to an inferior at the rate of 33%.
(Table 5.4)
(9)
RS5I
...I would
really
like
to
see
it
before I leave...
There were
request data,
only
two
locution
derivables
in the
in RSs 3 and 8, the former addressed a
superior and the latter addressed an inferior at the
rate of 8%. (Table 5.5)
(10) RS3S
...I have an important appointment
and have to leave before 5:00 today.
In the example above, the speaker does not express the
request
explicitly,
but
the
illocutionary
force
derivable from the semantic meaning of the locution.
is
81
TABLE : 5.2
Head Acts. English Baseline
N = 3
SITU A T :
I0 N
SUPERIOR
INFERIOR
Head act.
1
N
1
After
Pre-adjunct
% 33
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
Average
for all
situations
2
1
1
2
2
2
11
66
33
33
66
66
66
45
1
2
1
1
2
8
33
66
33
33
66
33
N
1
Before
Pre-adjunct
% 33
N
Between
Pre and post
%
adjunct
1
1
1
3
33
33
33
12
N
1
1
2
1
1
2
1
9
%
33
33
66
33
33
66
33
37
in isolation
82
The scope stating strategy occurred only in RSsI 5 and
Both were addressed to inferiors.
For example:
(11) RS6I
...I'll give you a big tip if you
can get me there as soon as you can.
Language specific suggestory formulas occurred only in
RSs 1 and 7 at the rate of 8%.
(12) RSIS I was wondering if you would allow
me extra time to finish my paper.
(13) RS7I
I know you wouldn't mind getting me a
packet of cigarettes.
The strategy of reference to preparatory conditions was
used
at
a
high
rate,
45%.
There
was
difference, in terms of social distance,
this
strategy,
so
this
variable was
not
a
big
in the use of
not
regarded
as
significant (25% vs 20%). Examples are as follows:
(14) RS4S Would you mind changing chairs?
(15) RSSI Could you please do it now?
At this level two types of request strategies are
included,
however none could be found
in the English
data.
5.2 Results and Summary
In the requests of English speakers; the most used
pre-adjunct was explanations (reasons) occurring at an
average
rate
of
45%.
Especially
in
RS2S,
where
a
student is to call a manager up to get more information
83
TABLE : 5.3
Post-adjuncts. English Baseline
N = 3
SITU A T I0 N
SUPERIOR
INFERIOR
Post-adj.
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
Average
for all
situations
N
1
1
2
1
1
2
8
%
33
33
66
33
33
66
33
Explanation
N
1
1
%
33
4
·· Sir ·■
N
'■ Please
%
84
TABLE : 5.4
Directness in requests. English Baseline
N = 3
s
IT U A T I0 N
SUPERIOR
INFERIOR
Average
for all
situations
Strategy
1
2
3
4
5
7
6
8
N
1
1
2
%
33
33
8
Imperatives
Explicit
N
Performatives
%
1
2
1
4
33
66
33
16
N
Hedged
Performatives
%
Locution
Derivable
1
1
33
4
N
1
1
2
%
33
33
8
N
1
1
2
%
33
33
8
Scope Stating
Language Spec. N
Suggestory
%
Formula
Reference to N
Preparatory
%
Conditions
N
Strong hints
%
N
Mild hints
%
1
1
2
33
33
8
1
1
2
2
1
1
2
1
11
33
33
66
66
33
33
66
33
45
85
about a job advertised in the paper, it occurred at the
rate of 100%.
Openers,
address terms and "please" as
pre-adjuncts were used at the rate of 8% for each.
Use
of "please" as pre-adjunct was found only in RSs 4 (to
a superior) and 6 (to an inferior).
In both of these
RSs "please" occurred with imperatives.
Head acts were
usually used after pre-adjuncts at an average rate of
45%.
Head acts in isolation were also found frequently
for
a
rate
of
37%.
Post-adjuncts
were
explanations occurring at the rate of 33%.
usually
"Sir" as
post-adjunct occurred only once for a rate of 4%.
In terms of directness in requests, English usage
seems
to
allow
strategies,
conditions
45%.
for more
specifially
strategy,
conventional
the
reference
indirect
to
level
preparatory
occurring at an average
rate
of
Imperatives at the most direct level also were
allowed in English, occurring 22% of the time.
As for
the nonconventional indirect level strategies,
it does
not allow any.
There was no example of these strategies
in the request data.
5.2 APOLOGIES
When expressing an apology,
in these data native
speakers of English were found quite consistent in terms
of
choosing
the phrase
"I am sorry".
prefer to use "I am sorry"
whether
apologizing
to
They
seem
to
in most of the situations
superiors
or
inferiors.
The
86
frequency
of
occurrence
is
74%
in the
apology data.
Apologetic formulas like "I apologize," "excuse me" and
"forgive me" were not found as frequent as "I'm sorry."
Other than these formulas,
in these data English
speakers tend to use expressions like "don't worry" or
"I'm
embarrassed"
that
do
not
involve
an
explicit
apology but are interpretable as apologies. These kinds
of expressions occurred at the rate of 16%. (Table 5.6)
As for the strategies of taking responsibility, in
these data English speaker seem to allow for a large
variety of strategies. For example, explanation of cause
and offer of repair strategies occurred very often, at
the rates of 33% and 45%. (Table 5.7)
Denial of fault
was the least used strategy in the apology data, at the
rate of 4%.
In terms of social distance, English speakers used
83% of "I'm sorry" patterns for social superiors while
66% of these patterns were used for inferiors.
"Excuse
me" and "forgive me"
were used only for inferiors.
the
responsibility
use
supplied
of
taking
more
(16%)
strategies,
self-deficiency
superiors than for inferiors (8%).
In
they
patterns
for
All of the explicit-
self blame strategies were used for superiors.
25% of
promise of forbearance occurred for superiors while 8%
of them for inferiors.
87
5.2.2 Expression of ApologyIn this group
the majority of the responses (74%)
included an expression of regret as in the utterance "I
am sorry" and only one answer was supplied as a request
for forgiveness as in "excuse me" and "forgive me" (4%).
"I'm sorry" occurs in all of the ASs, especially in
10, 11 and 13 where it was supplied at the rate of 100%.
(Table 5.5)
Social distance does not seem to be a factor
in the selection of this strategy.
(16) ASllS I'm sorry I'm returning this book
so late.
An offer of apology in the form of "I apologize"
never occurred in the apology data.
Two types of requests for forgiveness "excuse me"
and "forgive me" occurred only twice in all ASs, in ASsI
14 and 16 (both addressed inferiors) at the rate of 33%.
(17)
AS14I
Please,
excuse
this
delay
in
meeting you...
(18) AS16I ...Please forgive me.
As
it
can
be
seen
in
the
examples
above,
"please"
typically occurred in requests for forgiveness addressed
to inferiors.
As an expression of an excuse (utterances do not
involve an overt apology but serve as an apology) four
different
patterns
occurred.
Two
of
them
follows:
(19) AS9S I'm very embarrassed about it.
are
as
88
TABLE : 5.5
An Expression of Apology English Baseline
N = 3
S I T U i^ T I 0 N
SUPERIOR
INFERIOR
Apology
9
N
2
%
66
Average
for all
16 situations
10
11
12
13
14
15
3
3
2
3
2
2
1
18
66 100
66
66
33
74
"I am sorry"
100 100
N
"I apologize"
%
N
1
1
%
33
4
" Excuse me
N
1
1
%
33
4
"forgive me
N
1
1
1
1
4
%
33
33
33
33
16
others
89
5.2.3 Acknowledgement of Responsibility
Self-deficiency strategies occurred in ASsS 9, 10
and 13 for an average rate of 12% overall.
(Table 5.7)
(21) AS13S What's wrong with me...
Explicit self-blame strategies did not occur very often;
only in ASsS 10 and 12 at the rate of 8%.
(22) AS12S I have made a mistake...
Denial of fault occurred very rarely only in AS16 at the
rate of 4%.
(23) AS16I Please don't be offended. It wasn't
meant as an insult.
The phrase
as
an
"don't be offended " can also be considered
expression
of
apology not
expressing
an overt
apology.
English speakers tended to make explanations about
their
faults
fault.
For
usually
stating
example,
in
reasons
ASll
and
that
16
cause
the
rate
the
of
occurrence is 66%.
(24) ASllS Sorry, I, was ill this week...
Explanations occurred equally when addressing superiors
and inferiors in the apology data.
An offer of repair strategy was used at the rate of
100% in ASs 12 and 15.
(25)
AS15I
...I'll
pay
for
the
damage
of
course.
The strategy of promise of forbearance occurred at the
rate of 100% in AS9S while it occurred at the rate of
90
TABLE : 5.6
An Acknowledgement of Responsibility English Baseline
N = 3
Ntimber and Percent Distribution
S IT Ui T I0 N
SUPERIOR
INFERIOR
Strategy
9
N
Self-deficiency
%
Explicit
Self-blame
10
11
12
13
14
15
1
1
1
3
33
33
33
12
N
1
1
2
%
33
33
8
N
Denial of fault
%
Explanation
N
or account of
cause
%
An affer of
repair
Promise of
forbearance
Average
for all
16 situations
1
1
33
4
1
1
2
1
1
2
11
33
33
66
33
33
66
33
N
2
3
2
1
3
11
%
66
100
66
33
100
45
N
3
1
4
%
100
33
16
91
33% in AS16I.
(26)
AS9S
...hopefully this will not happen
again.
Expressing apologies in terms of semantic formulas
the most commonly used pattern is "I'm sorry", occurring
at the rate of 74%.
Expression of an excuse without an
overt apology formula occurred at the rate of 16% while
an offer of apology formula, "I apologize" did not occur
at all.
The most used taking responsibility strategy is
the offer of repair that occurred at an average rate of
45%.
at
Explanation or account of cause strategy was found
the
rate
of
33%.
Other
responsibility were infrequent.
strategies
in
taking
ASsS 10 and 12 were the
only situations which elicited an explicit self-blame
strategy pattern.
Denial of fault strategy occurred at
the rate of 4% only in AS16I.
5.3 COMPARISON
This
section
similarities
patterns,
consists
between
of
Turkish
three main
and
English
parts;
(1)
speech
act
(2) differences between Turkish and English
speech act patterns and (3) major points.
5.3.1 Similarities
5.3.1.1
Similarities
between
Turkish
and
English
Requests
In
general,
Turkish
and
English
usages,
both
allowing for pre-adjuncts, provided the data in a large
92
variety of terms and phrases used as pre-adjuncts in a
request situation.
"please"
and
occurred
in
Units like openers, address terms,
utterances
both
aimed
languages.
characteristic of both languages,
at
as
As
an
explanations
outstanding
explanations to the
head acts occurred almost in all RSs at the high rates
40% in Turkish and 45% in English.
Use of apologetic formulas in a request utterance
seems to be a common characteristic of both languages.
These formulas are usually "excuse me," "I am sorry" in
Turkish and "excuse me" in English.
Use of titles like
"sir" and names were also found in both languages, but
rarely in both.
A head act after a pre-adjunct was the most common
usage in terms of sequencing, occurring at the rates of
47% in Turkish and of 45% in English.
In terms of directness in requests, utterances in
both languages seem to occur generally at the level of
conventional indirectness.
Some of the indirect speech
act patterns found in the request data are as follows;
Turkish:
...alirmisiniz (can you buy...)
...alabilirmisiniz (could you
buy...)
...gikabilirmiyim (may I leave...)
English: can you get me...
would you mind...
may I leave...
93
Examples above were selected from RSs 3 and 7 in
the questionnaire.
well
as
the
situations.
The similarity here is the form as
occurrence
of
the patterns
in
the
same
Turkish "alirmisiniz" and "alabilirmisiniz"
were supplied for RS7I addressed to an inferior,
and
English "can you get me" and "would you mind getting me"
occurred in the same R S .
One of the most used strategies of the conventional
indirect level was reference to preparatory conditions
exemplified
above,
occurring
at the
Turkish and of 45% in English.
rates
of
46%
in
Imperatives at the most
direct level occurred at low rates in both languages.
This
type was
found occurring with
"please"
in both
languages as in "Please, sit in the sofa..."
Nonconventional indirect level strategies such as
mild hints and strong hints were used rarely in Turkish
and not at all in English.
5.3.1.2
Similarities
between
Turkish
and
English
Apologies
Turkish and English usage both allow for similar
apologetic formulas like "excuse me" and "I am sorry" in
apology situations.
Both Turkish and English speakers
tended
variety
to
use
a
of
apologetic
formulas
addressing superiors and inferiors without taking the
social distance into account.
As
for the
strategies
of taking
responsibility,
speakers of both languages used quite similar strategies
94
in the same ASs.
For example,
the strategy of self
deficiency as in "I’m so forgetful" occurred in ASs 9,
10 and 13 in both languages.
Speakers of both languages
tended to use more than one strategy in the same AS.
5.3.2 Differences
5.3.2.1 Differences between Turkish and English Request
patterns
In terms of sequencing strategies in requests, the
two
languages
differ
in pre-adjunct
terms.
Turkish
usage seems to allow for a variety of pre-adjuncts more
than
does
dilerim"
English.
(I'm
For
sorry),
apologetic formula),
"hocam"
example,
"kusura
terms
bakmayın"
"iyi günler"
like
(a
"özür
stronger
(good afternoon) and
(a term used for teachers) are the terms that
occurred in Turkish but not in English.
Explanations as
pre-adjuncts other than reasons occurred as apologetic
expressions like "I'm disturbing you" or "it will cause
you
trouble"
in
Turkish
while
these
kinds
of
pre
adjuncts occurred in a different way in English as in "I
know how busy you are but...."
Use of "please" as pre-adjunct was found more
in
English while it was not so frequent in Turkish (8% vs
6%).
Turkish
expressions
usage
meant
as
allows
for
requests
the
without
utterances
or
involving
an
explicit request pattern as in "these letters need to be
typed soon" or this presentation will be done a week
earlier"
(also
explained
in
directness
in
requests)
95
while
English usage does not allow for this kind of
utterance as much as Turkish does.
English speakers seem to prefer to use a head act
before a post-adjunct at the rate of 33% while Turkish
speakers did not use this strategy so often, occurring
at the rate of 8%.
It can be concluded that English
usage allows for explanations both before and after a
head act while Turkish allows for more explanations as
pre-adjuncts.
Head acts in isolation occurred at the rate of 10%
in Turkish and of 37% in English.
This result shows
that Turkish speakers have a tendency to encompass a
request with other expressions, mostly with explanations
in their request strategies.
As for the post-adjuncts,
Turkish usage seems to
allow more kinds than does English; terms like "teşekkür
ederim"
(thank you)
and
"özür
dilerim"
(I am sorry)
occurred as post-adjuncts at the rates of 1% and 0.5% in
Turkish while English data provided only the term "sir"
as a post-adjunct
at the rate of
4%.
Explanation as
post-adjunct to the head act was a more used strategy in
English (33%) than was Turkish (9%).
Directness
discriminating
English.
in
requests
can
characteristic
Only
the
be
considered
between
strategies
of
Turkish
using
not
a
and
explicit
performatives occurred more (12%) in English compared to
Turkish
(7%),
and contrastively, hedged performatives
96
occurred at the rate of 7% in Turkish while it was at
the rate of 4% in English.
As for the nonconventional
indirect level request strategies, strong hints and mild
hints occurred at the rates of 1% and 0.5% in Turkish
while none occurred in English.
that
English
speakers
are
It can be interpreted
relatively
more
direct
in
their request strategies than Turkish speakers are.
5.3.2.2 Differences between Turkish and English Apology
Patterns
In general, more apologetic formulas were allowed
in
Turkish
patterns
"Kusura bakmayın"
"özür dilerim"
compared
to
English
patterns.
(a strong apology for forgiveness),
(I apologize)
and "mahcubum"
(a strong
apology like "I'm embarrassed") were found as typical
formulas in Turkish apology strategies.
Interestingly,
"I apologize" as an offer of apology never occurred in
the English data while it occurred at the rate of 9% in
Turkish.
"Kusura bakmayın" is a typical formula found
more in ASs addressed to inferiors in Turkish.
An expression of regret as in "I am sorry" was the
most used formula in English at the rate of 75% while it
was
6% in Turkish.
Other
expressions which are not
overt apologies but are intended to apologize like "I
think I kept you waiting long"
"you are right"
(AS12S)
(AS14I) in Turkish and
in English vary
in kind and
frequency; occurring at the rates of 12% in Turkish and
of 16% in English.
97
Taking responsibility strategies also differed in
number; denial of fault strategy occurred at the rate of
8%
in
Turkish while
English.
occurring
at
the
rate of 4%
in
Thus, Turkish students can be said to tend to
refuse the need to apologize more than English speakers.
Explanation or account of cause strategy occurred at the
rate of 18% in Turkish and of 33% in English.
of
repair
also
was
a
frequent
strategy
in
An offer
English
occurring at the rate of 45% while it was at the rate of
26% in Turkish.
Compared to Turkish speakers, English
speakers were found to have a tendency to promise more
forbearance in their apology strategies (16% vs 3%).
5.3.3 Major Points and Conclusions
In this study, through the situations given in the
form of a questionnaire, similarities and differences in
the
use
of
speech
acts
across
cultures could be identified.
Turkish
and
English
Thus, by this comparison
it was found that certain culturally different utterances
and strategies in request and apology situations could
be identified and these different utterances may lead to
the production of inappropriate speech acts in the target
language.
For
example,
it
was
found
that
Turkish
speakers are much more likely to use pre-adjuncts like
"I know how busy you are but..." as explanations before
the speech act than are English speakers.
difference
seems
to reflect
in
their
English using explanations at high rates.
Actually, this
performance
in
Compare these
98
two;
RS3S
(Turkish)
Ne
kadar
meşgul
olduğunuzu
biliyorum fakat önemli bir işten dolayı 17:00
den
önce
ayrılmam
gerekiyor.
Müsadenizi
istiyorum (I know how busy you are but I need
to leave before 5:00 because of an important
reason. I want your permission.)
RS3S (English L2) I am sorry I know you are
busy, but I have to leave early. Could you let
me leave early?
In
the
examples
above,
the
student
seems
to
transfer his/her strategy of making a request, that is,
making long explanation before stating the request in
English.
Similarly, use of an apologetic form like "excuse
me" or "I am sorry" when starting a request can be said
to be
a reflection
occurrence of
English
(L2)
of
Turkish
the apologetic
responses
of
usage.
formulas
The
rate
of
in Turkish and
Turkish
students
was
interestingly found at the same rate, 9%.
In terms of directness, certain language specific
utterances in requests were found to be translated from
Turkish in a few request situations especially in RS6I.
The following responses seem to be direct translations
from Turkish;
RS6I
(English L2)
Let's
go to the Esenboga
Airport (to a taxi driver).)
99
RS6I (English L2) ...Please let's go fast
Examples above indicate that a common use of the
Turkish request "havaalanına gidelim" ("Let's go to the
Airport") as
the most direct strategy when addressing
a taxi driver occurred correspondingly in the English L2
data.
Another form that seem to be the translation of a
Turkish pattern is the utterance of "if it is possible
for you,
I'd like to get..." whose correspondence
in
Turkish is probably "...daha fazla bilgi vermeniz mümkün
mü?"
("Is
it
information").
possible
Both
for
of
you
to
give
these utterances
more
are
the
responses of Turkish students to the same situation in
Turkish
and English.
Consequently,
Turkish
students
seem to transfer some of the forms and strategies
in
requesting behavior from Turkish to English.
As for apologies, the situation is relatively the
same
as
for requests.
Semantic
formulas
in Turkish
occur in a large variety, however this did not identify
the inappropriate use of English patterns since English
usage does not allow for more apology formulas.
formulas
equivalents
"özür
dilerim"
of English
"I
and
am
"üzgünüm"
sorry".
Turkish
are
the
Turkish
usage
allows for the use of "özür dilerim" and "üzgünüm" in
the meaning of English
Thus,
"I am sorry"
in a situation.
Turkish students seem to use "I am sorry" at a
very high rate in English including the two strategies
100
in one formula.
In acknowledgement
the
Turkish
data
of responsibility
showed
that
strategies,
self-deficiency
explicit self-blame were not frequent strategies.
and
Based
on the Turkish data results, it can be said that Turkish
students
did not very often use
responding to situations
cause
and
promise
of
these
in English.
forbearance
strategies
in
Explanation of
strategies
also
go
parallel in terms of frequency in Turkish and English
responses of Turkish students.
5.5.4 Summary
5.5.4.1 Requests
There seems to be similarities between Turkish and
English request patterns as well as differences.
Most
of the similarities occurred at the level of structure
in terms of sequencing in a request pattern.
The most
specific unit, explanation as pre-adjunct was found to
occur proportionately
directness
in
similar
requests,
in both
both
languages.
Turkish
and
In
English
speakers prefer conventional indirect level strategies,
specifically
reference
to
preparatory
conditions.
Infrequent use of the most direct and nonconventional
indirect strategies were also found relatively similar
in
two
terms
languages.Although
of proportion,
similarities
Turkish
occur,
in
and English pre-adjunct
patterns show a distinctive character, Turkish allowing
for
more
varieties
of
units.
Head
acts
differed
101
proportionately
in
English
and
Turkish.
Turkish
students used more pre- and post-adjuncts with head acts
while
English
isolation.
speakers
prefer
In directness
more
head
strategies,
acts
English
in
has
a
distinctive characteristic that is the use of explicit
performatives
rate
in
(at the most direct
contrast
performatives
in
to
more
Turkish.
level)
frequent
Turkish
at a higher
use
of
allowed
hedged
for
two
strategies, but English does not, at the nonconventional
indirect level.
From the social
distance point of view,
English
openers as pre-adjuncts were only used when addressing
superiors
while
superiors
and
Turkish
openers
inferiors
with
occurred
similar
for
both
proportions.
"Please" as pre-adjunct occurred more, in Turkish, when
addressing inferiors while there was no difference
in
the proportions of occurrence of "please" in English.
Hedged performatives occurred,
in Turkish, most of the
time for superiors while it occurred only for inferiors
in English. Strong hints and mild hints (nonconventional
indirect level) were only used when addressing inferiors
in Turkish but they occurred for neither superiors nor
inferiors in English.
the interlocutors
Thus, the social distance between
seems to be an important factor
choosing request strategies.
in
102
5.5.4.2 Apologies
Similar apologetic formulas of English and Turkish
like
"excuse
me"
in
English
and
"affedersiniz"
in
Turkish expressing the same semantic meaning occurred in
both languages.
The utterances that do not involve an
overt apology but an expression of excuse occurred at
approximately
the
same rates
in ASs
15 and 16
(when
addressing inferiors) in both languages.
Although
apology
Turkish
formulas
to
seems
those
of
to
have
English
corresponding
ones,
a
large
variety of apologetic formulas occur differently.
The
two Turkish formulas "üzgünüm" and "özür dilerim" which
correspond to English "I'm sorry" occurred in different
proportions
in
the
two
languages.
Turkish
"affedersiniz" corresponding (semantically)
to English
"excuse me"
it did
English.
occurred more
Three
taking
explanation of cause,
forbearance
were
in Turkish
than
responsibility
in
strategies,
offer of apology and promise of
used
proportionately
differently
in
English and Turkish.
In terms of social distance, English speakers tend
to address the patterns of "excuse me" and "forgive me"
to
inferiors
correspondent
more
than
superiors.
of these patterns,
equally addressed
The
Turkish
"affedersiniz",
to superiors and
inferiors.
were
Self
deficiency strategy patterns occurred more for superiors
in English while it occurred more for inferiors.
It is
103
a distinctive characteristic
of the two
address
to
the
strategy
type
either
languages
superiors
inferiors as well as choosing these strategy types.
to
or
C H A P T E R VI
L2 EXPERIMENTAL DATA
6.1 REQUESTS
In the production of English request patterns, the
most used unit was the head acts in isolation occurring
at the rate of 58% while the least used one was post
adjuncts 8% of the time.
Pre-adjuncts occurred at the
rate of 38% (Figure 6.1).
Turkish students used three
types of pre-adjuncts; (1) openers like "excuse me," "I'm
sorry"
"pardon" and "good morning";
(2) address terms
like "sir," "miss," "boss" and a name of a person;
explanations
such as "I want
to get more
about the job" and (4) "please."
(3)
information
The most used pre
adjunct was explanation for the request occurring at the
rate of 18%.
Head acts with pre-adjuncts occurred at the
rate of 26%.
When the post-adjuncts were present they
usually occurred as explanations to the head acts, in 13%
of the request patterns.
It was also found that when
responding to the same situation the same explanation
occurred sometimes as pre- and sometimes post-adjunct in
responding to the same situation.
importance
of
the
reason
for
In these cases the
the
speaker
may
be
considered as an influential factor in sequencing.
In terms of directness in requests, Turkish students
seem
to
prefer
to
use
conventional
indirect
level
105
strategy was the most used strategy at the rate of 68%.
No
imperatives
superiors.
could
be
found
Nonconventional
in
RSs
indirect
addressed
to
level strategies
were not very frequent; strong hints occurred at the rate
of 1% in RSs 2, 4 and 6, (addressing both superiors and
inferiors), and mild hints did not occur at all.
From the social distance point of view,
Turkish
students used most of the openers and address terms for
superiors rather than inferiors.
For instance, they used
20% of the openers for superiors and only 2% of them for
inferiors.
"Please"
as
pre-adjunct
occurred
for
superiors at the rate of 4% while it occurred at the rate
of 3% for inferiors.
Head acts in isolation usually
occurred for inferiors (49%) especially in RS7I where the
speakers
are
to
ask
a
doorman
to
buy
a
packet
of
cigarettes. Ninety percent of the responses occurred as
requests
in
isolation.
Post-adjuncts
were
used
for
inferiors at the rate of 3% while 7% of them occurred
for superiors.
Using directness
strategies
Turkish
students used all
of the
imperatives when addressing
social inferiors.
There'was no a big difference in the
strategies at conventional indirect level in terms of
social
distance.
level strategies,
As
for
the nonconventional
indirect
strong hint and mild hint strategies
were used for superiors more than for inferiors.
Other than the request patterns analyzed here, a
considerable number of linguistically incorrect responses
106
were taken out,
Figure 6.1
(in numbers and percents)
Pre -adjuncts
Head Acts
N
%
N
66
38
Post-adjunct
Q.
102
■o
N
%
58
14
8
Explanations
occurred
in
a
large
variety.
24
different types of explanations occurred as pre-adjuncts.
Especially in RS4S which requires a request for a teacher
who is about to sit in the favorite chair of a student's
father,
40%
of
the
students
tended
to
provide
explanations.
(1) RS4S I don't want my father to be upset,
and this is his favorite chair. Would you...?
Turkish students tend to start a request with an
apologetic formula especially when addressing superiors,
at
the rate
addressing
of
68%
inferiors
(Table
in
supplied an apology term.
6.1).
RS5I,
For
9%
of
example,
the
when
students
This is the only RSI which
involved this type of opener when addressing inferiors.
(2) RS3S I'm sorry, I must leave earlier than
5 pm. Can you allow me?
107
TABLE : 6.1
Pre-adj uncts. Lz
N = 22
Number aad Percent Distribution
S IT UA T I0 N
SUPERIOR
INFERIOR
Pre-adj.
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
Average
for all
situations
N
2
3
7
6
2
22
%
9
13
31
27
9
11
N
1
4
8
8
3
4
2
3
33
%
4
18
36
36
13
18
9
13
18
N
1
1
3
2
1
8
%
4
4
13
9
4
4
N
3
1
2
1
7
%
13
4
9
4
3.5
Openers
Explanations
Address terms
” Please
108
TABLE : 6.2
Pre-adjuncts. Lz
N = 22
S IT UA T I0 N
SUPERIOR
INFERIOR
Pre-adj.
1
N
"Excuse me
I am sorry"
P
%
E
M
N
E
R "Good morning"
%
0
A
D
D
Rr
E
S
T
E
R
M
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
Average
■for all
situations
1
1
7
6
2
17
4
4
31
27
9
9
2
2
9
1
N
1
3
1
1
6
%
4
13
4
4
3
N
6
9
4
4
23
%
27
40
18
18
12
N
4
3
%
18
13
Sir / title
Explanation
(reason)
Explanotion
(other)
7
3.5
N
3
1
2
1
7
%
13
4
9
4
3.5
Please
109
RSs
involved
requests
eliciting
more
to
requests
address
inferiors.
addressed
terms
(Table
than
6.1)
to
superiors
those
eliciting
While
13% of the
responses in RS3S were found to involve address terms
like "sir" only one could be found in RSIS addressed to
an inferior.
(3) RS3S Sir, may I leave earlier today?
In terms of openers and address terms, RS3S seems
to be the situation which elicited these strategies the
most.
Use of "please" as a pre-adjunct was not found
distinctive, at the rate of 3%.
It was supplied in RSs
1 and 4 were addressed to superiors and in RSs 6 and 8
were addressed to inferiors.
For example, in RSIS, 13%
of the students used please as an opener.
(4)
RSIS
Please,
would
you
give
me
an
extension?
6.1.2.2 Head Acts
The most used structure found in the request data
was the head act in isolation occurring at the rate of
58%.
For example, in RS7I when addressing an inferior
it occurred at the rate of 90% having the most of all
RSs (Table 6.3).
(5) RS7I Would you buy me a packet of cigarettes?
Head acts before post-adjuncts did not occur very often
especially when addressing superiors.
For instance, it
was supplied in RS2S at the rate of 4% while in RS6I it
was 13%.
110
Table : 6.3
Head Acts. Lz
N = 22
S I T U ¿\ T I 0 N
SUPERIOR
INFERIOR
Head act.
10
11
12
13
14
15
6
6
11
11
4
3
2
4
47
27
27
50
50
18
13
9
18
26
1
3
1
2
5
2
14
4
13
4
9
22
9
7
9
N
After
Pre-adjunct
%
Average
for all
16 situations
N
Before
Pre-adjunct
%
N
Between
Pre and post
%
adjunct
2
1
3
9
4
1.5
N
13
12
8
2
9
13
20
13
90
%
59
54
36
9
40
59
90
59
50.7
in isolation
Ill
(6) RS6I Try to be quick because I must catch the
plane.
Head acts between pre and post-adjuncts occurred only in
RSsS 2 and 4 at the rates of 9% and 4%, when addressing
superiors.
(7) RS4S Please,
can you sit down another chair?
This is very important for my father.
While
in
RS6I
there
were
4
(18%)
explanations
appended to the head act, none occurred in RSs 1 and 7.
(8) RS6I Could you go fast please? I may miss
the plane if you go slow.
In the following examples, the same explanation occurred
as pre- and post-adjunct in the same RSS.
(9) RSSS My mum had an operation. I need to be
in the hospital...
(10)
RSSS May
I go earlier
than
5 pm.? My
mother is ill.
6.1.3
6.1.3.1 Strategies at the Most Direct Level
No imperatives could be found in the requests from
inferiors to superiors while they occurred in RSsI 6 and
8, addressed to inferiors, at the rates of 36% and 9%.
(Table 6.5)
(11)
hour.
RS8I
Please,
type these
letters
in an
112
TABLE : 6.4
Post-adjuQts. Lz
N = 22
S IT U A T I0 N
SUPERIOR
INFERIOR
Post-adj.
1
Explanation
(reason)
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
Average
for all
situations
N
2
1
1
4
2
10
%
9
4
4
18
9
13
N
1
1
1
1
4
%
4
4
4
4
2
other
N
6
2
1
4
2
5
6
26
%
27
9
4
18
9
22
27
14
" Please
113
TABLE : 6.5
Directness in requests. La
N = 22
S IT U A T I0 N
SUPERIOR
INFERIOR
Average
Strategy
- ■f'O'P
2
1
3
4
5
6
7
8
11
situations
N
8
2
10
%
36
9
5
Imperatives
Explicit
N
Performatives
%
1
2
1
1
5
4
9
4
4
2
N
2
1
3
%
9
4
1.5
N
1
2
1
4
%
4
9
4
2
N
Hedged
Performatives
%
Locution
Derivable
Scope Stating
Language Spec. N
Suggestory
%
Formula
Reference to N
Preparatory
%
Conditions
1
1
2
4
4
1
18
12
19
12
13
11
21
15
121
81
54
86
54
59
50
95
68
68
N
1
1
1
3
%
4
4
4
1.5
Strong hints
N
1
1
%
4
0.5
Mild hints
114
Interestingly, none of the students used an imperative
when
addressing
driver
(RS6I)
a doorman
and
(RS7I)
a doorman
even
are
of
though a taxi
nearly
the
same
social class.
Explicit performatives which allow the speaker to
do the action the verb names by using the verb (Austin,
1962)
did
not
occur
in
the
request
data.
Hedged
performatives was also found rare; at the rate of 3% in
RSs addressing superiors and at the rate of 2% in RSs
addressing inferiors.
(Table 6.5)
(12) RS5I I want you to make your presentation
a week earlier.
Locution
derivables
in
which
the
illocutionary
point is directly derivable from the semantic meaning of
the locution occurred only in RSs 2 and 5 at the rates
of 9% and 4%. (Table 6.5)
(13) RS5I You must be ready this week.
Scope stating strategies were supplied to RSsS 2, 4 and
(14) RS4S I don't want my father to be upset.
And this is his favorite chair.
Only
two
examples
of
language
specific
suggestory
formulas could be found in RSsS 3 and 4 at the rate of
1%.
Examples are as follows:
(15) RS3S Do you mind if I leave early?
115
(16) RS4S Would you mind sitting next to that
chair?
Strategies
that
involve reference to preparatory
conditions were used in all RSs at the rate of 68%.
For
instance, in RS7I it occurred at the rate of 95% while
it was at the rate of 50% in RS6I, the least of all RSs.
(17)
RS7I
Would
you
buy
me
a
packet
of
cigarettes?
(18) RS6I Can you take me to Esenboga Airport
please?
Only three examples of strong hints occurred in RSs
2, 4 and 7 at the rate of 1%.
(19) RS7I I need a packet of cigarettes.
A mild hint occurred only in RS4 at the rate of 0.5%.
(20) RS4S Sorry. I don't want to sit in this
room. Can we stay in my room?
In
students
responding
tended
to
to . the
use
RSs
in
apologetic
English,
formulas
adjuncts especially when addressing superiors.
Turkish
as
pre
"Excuse
me" and "I am sorry" occurred at the rate of 99%.
Use
of titles, names and "please" was not found very often.
However
in
RS3
"excuse
me,"
occurred the most of all RSs.
"sir"
and
explanations
This could be from the
situation itself where there is a possibility of being
rejected
by
the
manager
who
is
requested
to
give
116
permission
to
the
secretary.
Explanations
typically
occurred as the potential reasons for the requests in
most of the RSs.
Head acts usually occurred after pre-adjuncts, at
the rate of 26%.
Without a pre- and post-adjunct, head
acts in isolation were the most used structure occurring
at
the
rate of
explanations
58%.
to
head
Post-adjuncts
acts
in
also occurred as
five
of
the
eight
situations at the rate of 13%.
In terms of directness, Turkish students supplied
most of their responses at the level of conventional
indirect, especially using the strategy of reference to
preparatory
conditions
at
the
rate
of
68%.
Hedged
performatives at the level of most direct occurred at
the rate of 2%.
8
Imperatives occurred only in RSsI 6 and
situations
addressed
to
inferiors.
The
nonconventional indirect level did not occur too much;
only strong hints were supplied in RSs 2, 4 and 7.
6.2 APOLOGIES
When
apologizing,
Turkish
students
tend
to
use
"excuse me" and "I'm sorry" at high rates, 52% and 16%.
(Table 6.6)
low rates.
the
"I apologize" and "forgive me" occurred at
Expression of apologies usually occurred as
strategies
sorry."
of
expression
Expressions
that
do
of
regret
not
as
in
"I
am
involve
an
overt
apology but are interpretable as apologies occurred at
117
the
rate
of
5%;
especially
in
AS16I,
13%
of
the
responses seem to involve utterances that are not overt
apologetic formulas.
For example, "I didn't want to say
so" does not involve an apologetic formula but involves
an expression of excuse.
Taking
responsibility
large variety.
strategies
occurred
in
a
For example, strategies of explanation
of cause and offer of repair occurred at the rates of
29% and 21% while promise of forbearance occurred only
at the rate of 4%. Self-deficiency occurred at a high
rate in AS15I.
Not a significant difference could be
found, in terms of social distance, between the ASs in
general.
When addressing social superiors Turkish students
used the formula "I am sorry" at the rate of 55% and
"excuse me" at the rate 'of 20%. For inferiors 49% of "I
am sorry" and 12% of "excuse me" were used.
They used
the "forgive me" pattern only for superiors.
In terms
of
taking
responsibility
differences
in
the
use
strategies
of
there
were
self-deficiency,
big
explicit
self-blame denial of fault and promise of forbearance
strategy
patterns
for
inferiors
and
superiors.
For
example, denial of fault strategy patterns occurred at
the
rate
of
superiors.
13%
for
inferiors
while
it
was
3%
for
118
6.2.2 An Expression of Apology
"I am sorry" occurred an average of 52% of the time
in all ASs.
For example in AS13I 72% of the students
supplied this pattern in their responses when addressing
an inferior.
(Table 6.6)
Trying to repair the fault or offence by offering
an overt performative apology, Turkish students tended
to use the strategy of an offer of apology at the rate
of 2% as in
(21) ASllS I apologize for forgetting to bring
the book.
In the ASs addressed to superiors and inferiors an equal
number
(2%)
supplied.
of
an
offer
of
apology
formulas
were
It seems that Turkish students do not use "I
apologize" very often in English.
In the apology data "Excuse me" occurred more often
than "forgive me."
For example,
"forgive me" occurred
only in ASsS 10 and 12 at the rate of 1% while "excuse
me" occurred in all ASs at the rate of 16%.
"Forgive
me" occurred only for superiors.
(22) ASIOS Excuse me, forgive me please, I was
in a hurry.
Note in this example that two formulas of request for
forgiveness occur probably to emphasize the meaning of
forgiveness.
This pattern was not usual.
Expressions that do not involve an overt apology
but an excuse which serves as an apology did not occur
119
TABLE : 6.6
An K3i>ression of Apology. Lz
N = 22
Number and Percent Disribution
S IT U AT I0 N
SUPERIOR
INFERIOR
Apology
Average
for all
16 situations
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
N
15
13
14
7
16
7
13
8
101
%
68
59
63
31
72
31
59
36
52
N
1
1
2
4
%
4
4
9
2
N
1
7
2
8
4
3
3
1
29
%
4
31
9
36
18
13
13
4
16
” I am sorry"
"I apologize"
" Excuse me
N
1
1
2
%
4
4
1
" forgive me
N
1
2
1
1
2
3
10
%
4
9
4
4
9
13
5
others
120
very often (5%).
(23) AS14I Believe me, I was very busy.
In this example,
the speaker states his/her excuse by
stating "I was very busy," apologizing implicitly.
6.2.3 An Acknowledgement of Responsibility
Expressing self-deficiency was not found very often
(7%) while explicit self-blame occurred at the rate of
18% in the request data.
Especially in AS15I, where a
professor runs into a students car and is to apologize,
40%
of
the
expression,
However,
students
mostly
in ASs
occur at all.
supplied
in the
11,
12 and
an
form of
explicit
self-blame
"it is my fault."
16 this strategy did not
Another type of this strategy,
"I have
made a mistake," occurred in ASIOS at the rate of 4%.
Denial of fault strategies were found frequent in
the apology data at a rate of 8% average.
(Table 6.7)
In AS13I, this strategy typically occurred at the rate
of 40% where a superior is to apologize to a taxi driver
for forgetting to pay for the fare. ASs 12 and 15 also
elicited this strategy but only at the rate of 9% for
each.
(24) AS15I Why did you park your car there?
(25) AS12S Do you want other meal?
Explanation or account of cause strategies were the
most
used
(Table 6.7)
strategies
occurring
at
the
rate
of
29%.
121
TABLE : 6.7
An Acknowledgement of Responsibility. Lz
N = 3
S IT UA T I0 N
SUPERIOR
INFERIOR
Strategy
9
N
Self-deficiency
%
14
15
Average
for all
16 situations
10
11
12
13
1
1
3
1
8
14
4
4
13
4
36
7
N
1
8
14
1
9
33
%
4
36
63
4
40
18
N
Denial of fault
%
1
2
9
2
1
15
4
9
40
9
4
8
Explicit
Self-blame
9
8
9
1
15
8
1
1
52
40
36
40
4
68
36
4
4
29
N
6
2
11
4
2
13
38
%
27
9
50
18
9
59
21
Explanation or N
account of
cause
%
An offer of
repair
Promise of
forbearance
N
3
3
3
%
13
13
13
9
4.8
122
(26) AS9S I'm very sorry.
I have completely
forgotten about the meeting.
Explanations usually were the reasons that led to the
fault or offence.
The offer of repair strategy occurred at the rate
of 21%. (Table 6.7)
(27) AS12S Forgive me. I '11 go and change it
at once.
Especially in ASs 12 and 15 the rate of occurrence is
very high in terms of this strategy (50% and 59%).
The promise of forbearance strategy occurred only in ASs
9, 11 and 16 at the rate of 4%.
(28) AS9S I'm so sorry.
I never do the same
again.
The use of apologetic formulas in English was found
quite similar to that of English speakers.
For example,
the use of "I'm sorry" in expressing an apology occurred
very often in the apology data (52%).
"Excuse me" is
also a frequent one occurring at the rate of 16% while
"I apologize" and "forgive me" did not occur so often.
In terms of taking responsibility, Turkish students
were found to use a large variety of these strategies
but usually at low rates.
taking
responsibility
were
All of the six strategies of
found
almost
in
all
ASs.
Especially, the explanation of cause and offer of repair
strategies occurred at the high rates of 29% and 21%.
123
AS13I typically elicited explanations at the rate of 68%
and self-blame strategy at the rate of 63%.
Promise of
forbearance is quite rare in the apology data occurring
at the rate of 5%.
6.3 Experimental Data and General Conclusions
Comparing
the experimental
data analysis results
and general conclusions elicited from the comparison of
Turkish and English patterns (Chapter V), the following
results were found:
6.3.1 Requests
In requests,
Turkish students prefer pre-adjuncts
over post-adjuncts fairly strongly while English allows
for
proportionately
more
post-adjuncts.
Turkish
students followed Turkish patterns in English and used
relatively fewer post-adjuncts. Although openers as pre
adjuncts are not very common in English they occur at a
high rate in Turkish.
Turkish students follow Turkish
patterns in their English production.
"Please" as post
adjunct did not occur in English while it occurred in
Turkish.
Turkish students used "please" as post adjunct
in English.
"please"
Although Turkish and English both allow for
as
proportionately
pre-adjunct,
less
Turkish
"please"
students
in English.
used
Head acts
before a post-adjunct are used at a relatively high rate
in English while Turkish allows for this pattern at a
low rate.
Turkish students followed Turkish usage and
*
used
proportionately
fewer
head
acts
before
a post
124
adjunct.
Directness in Turkish and English seems to occur at
the same level that is, conventionally indirect.
But,
English allows for more of the most direct strategies
like explicit performatives than does Turkish.
students
seem
to follow
explicit performatives
occurred
at
Turkish usage
at all.
by not
Although
the nonconventional
Turkish
using
no strategy
indirect
level
in
English, Turkish allowed for these strategies but at low
rates.
Turkish students
seemto
follow
Turkish
strategies in English.
6.3.2 Apologies
Turkish usage allows for more apologetic formulas
in
the
expression
relatively
of
apology
fewer.Turkish
while
students
English
allows
to
follow
seem
Turkish patterns in terms of proportion in using, for
example, "affedersiniz" (excuse me) approximately at the
same
rate
in Turkish
and English.
Although
English
usage did not allow for any offer of apology pattern "I
apologize"
its
corresponding
form
Turkish occurred at a high rate.
"özür
dilerim"
in
Turkish students seem
to transfer the use of this pattern in English using "I
apologize."
Taking
responsibility
strategies,
for
example, an offer of repairment, occurred infrequently
in Turkish compared to English.
This also seems to be
followed in English to a certain extent.
The denial of
fault strategy occurred approximately at the same rates
125
in Turkish and English L2 experimental data while it was
found fairly lower in English.
proportionately
more
promise
While English allows for
of
forbearance
strategy
Turkish students prefer to use this strategy at least
parallel to the proportion of Turkish usage.
CHAPTER VII
CONCLUSION
7.1 Summary of the Study
This study discusses the cross-cultural aspect of
speech act patterns in L2 production.
the
similarities
English
and differences
request
and
It establishes
between
apology
patterns
Turkish
and
through
a
comparative method linking them with different cultural
norms and cultural assumptions.
the
similarities
patterns
and
In order to establish
differences
between
of Turkish and English provided
speech
act
from native
speakers of Turkish and English, a comparative analysis
proposed as universal for all language studies was used
in the analysis of data.
Two sets of questionnaires
(Turkish and English) consisting of sixteen situations,
eight eliciting requests and eight eliciting apologies
were
used as the
instruments
for this
study.
After
Turkish and English baseline data were collected from
the native speakers of these two languages through these
questionnaires,
with
the L2 experimental data was elicited
the English
questionnaire
from
the
same
set of
twenty-two university students who had also provided the
Turkish baseline data.
The written responses of the students and of three
native English speakers who are English professors at
Bilkent
University
were
analyzed
by
means
of
a
nonstatistical analysis since the scope of this study
127
has been descriptive.
The coding scheme used in the
comparative analysis of request patterns consists of two
main categories: (1) units of analysis and (2) directness
in requests.
For apologies, a set of semantic formulas
associated with the speech act of apology and a range of
apology
strategies
responses.
provided
This
was
kind
of
accountable
variability
in
speech acts.
the
applied
in
the
contrastive
results
analysis
for
realization
analysis
of
method
cross-cultural
patterns
of
the
same
The speech act patterns were also described
both from social superiors' and inferiors' points of view
since an intended request and/or apology, for example,
may be interpreted as being sensitive to such social
distance.
7.2 Conclusions
Based
speech
act
differences
on
the
comparison
patterns,
between
the
thé
of
Turkish
question
realization
of
and
English
whether
patterns
in
the
two
languages led to inappropriate use of L2 patterns (both
culturally and linguistically)
while the similarities
led the students to use appropriate patterns was posited.
Answers to this question can be stated under two titles
as positive and negative titles:
7.2.1 Positive Transfer
(1)
same
Both English and Turkish usages allow for the
set of units
in means
of sequencing in request
128
utterances.
Although Turkish has more variety in units,
it was found to lead to positive transfer to English
usage.
(2)
Both
English
and
Turkish
requests
normally
occurred at the conventionally indirect level usually
selecting
the
conditions
strategy
type
reference
(Could you do it? etc.).
to preparatory
This similarity
encouraged appropriate use of English patterns.
(3)
Although
neither
of
these
strategies
were
commonly used, the most direct level and nonconventional
indirect level strategies, both in English and Turkish,
occurred consistently with the situations in terms of
social
distance:
addressing
the
social
former
inferiors
as
and the
imperatives
when
latter as strong
hints to superiors.
7.2.2 Negative Transfer
(1) Making long explanations before uttering the
request was found as a typical characteristic of Turkish
usage.
Students supplied this characteristic in their
English patterns creating deviant expressions in English.
(2)
The
use
of
apologetic
expressions
before
a
request in Turkish led the students to use exaggerated
request patterns in English.
In English only "excuse
me" as an apologetic expression in requests occurred in
certain situations when addressing superiors.
So the
extended use of apologetic expressions both in variety
129
and number was deviant in English.
(3) Turkish students seem to follow Turkish patterns
in using post-adjunct less than pre-adjuncts in their
request patterns in English.
(4) Using openers when starting a request, Turkish
students seem to follow Turkish patterns which allow for
more openers.
(5) Since Turkish usage, compared to English, allows
for more nonconventional
requests
Turkish
indirect level strategies
students
transfer
these
in
strategy-
patterns in English.
(6) Apologetic formulas in Turkish occurred in a
larger variety than in English.
Turkish students do not
seem
patterns
to
transfer
the
Turkish
but
do
have
difficulty in choosing "excuse me" and "I am sorry," to
indicate
appropriate
social
distance.
Which
one
is
appropriate in which situations is unclear because these
two
formulas
function
alike
in
Turkish,
but
not
in
English.
(7)
Using
taking
responsibility
strategies
in
Turkish seems to be transferred in English occurring at
lower rates.
Other than these conclusions, lack of proficiency
and lack of mastery of the speech act forms in English
were also observed as an important factor leading the
students to use linguistically inappropriate patterns.
130
For example, some of the responses like *"may you give
permission?" occurred in the request data approximately
at the rate of 7%.
These responses occurred as a result
of lack of mastery of the second language structure.
They
also
have
a tendency
to
transfer
the
forms
of
corresponding Turkish patterns to English.
7.3 Assessment of the Study
The conclusions drawn from the comparison of the
two sets of language patterns is limited because of the
limited number of native speakers,
especially for the
English baseline data.
Furthermore,
some of the situations presented in
the questionnaire may be interpreted as culturally nonTurkish since approximately half of the students did not
provide a response to these situations.
For example, in
RS4S where a student is to ask a teacher,
home,
at his/her
not to sit on his/her father's favorite chair,
students explicitly stated that such situations never
occur
in
their
house.
A
questionnaire
based
on
the
informal observations of natural situations which occur
in both cultures needs to be developed.
7.4 Suggestions for further Studies
More research to describe speech act patterns in
terms of their cultural and linguistic functions in the
area of cross-cultural differences needs to be done to
provide
a broader comparative
base.
Data collection
131
methods based on the observations of informal and actual
social
situations,
and oral responses
of students to
social contexts should be developed in order to establish
more reliable results.
For this study,
the data were
collected through a written questionnaire.
Oral data
needs to supplement the written data to assure accuracy.
In such socio-cultural studies,
background and social
class variables would also be focused on when describing
the speech act behaviors.
7.5 Pedagogical Implications
Speech act behavior reflects culturally dependent
conventionality,
that
is,
speakers'
agreement
on the
overall need to use a given speech act and on its most
acceptable
possible
or
frequent
realizations
realizations.
occur
in
a
wide
However,
the
range.
The
question of what the priorities and specific goals are
should be answered to apply the results of this kind of
research to teaching situations.
The most prominent goal
seems to be the definition of cultural differences in
speech act behavior across languages.
For the purpose
of syllabus design it would be assumed that the learner
needs to know how to request and apologize in a variety
of
interactive
language.
of
discourse
situations
in
the
target
Making the learner aware of overall patterns
behavior
in
the
target
culture
and
of
available
choices for speech act realization may well help learners
132
become better users of input in L2.
Modern textbooks
that lack theoretical description and research evidence
should base their selections on these kinds of research
results.
133
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136
Appendix A
SÖZEYLEMLERİ İLE İLGİLİ ANKET
AÇIKLAMA:
Aşağıdaki durumları dikkatle okuyunuz ve bu durumlarda
ne söyleyeceğinizi verilen boşluklara yazınız.
RİCALAR
1.
Bir
üniversitede
hazırlayacağınız
ödev
öğrencisiniz.
için
çok
kısa
Bir
dersten
süreniz
kaldı.
Hocanızdan ödevi bitirmek için daha fazla süre istemeniz
gerekiyor.
2.
Bu durumda hocanıza ne dersiniz?
Gazatede
bulunacaksınız.
için
şirket
çıkan
bir
iş
ilanı
için
başvuruda
Iş ile ilgili daha fazla bilgi almak
yöneticisini
arıyorsunuz.
Ona
ne
söylersiniz?
3. Büyük bir bilgisayar şirketinde sekretersiniz.
0 gün
işyerinden saat 17'den önce ayrılmanız gerekiyor.
Fakat
müdürünüz o anda çok meşgul.
söylersiniz?
izin istemek için ona ne
137
4.
Evinizde
misafir
olan
bir
hocanız
sevdiği bir koltuğa oturmak üzere.
babanızın
çok
Beş dakika içinde
babanız gelebilir ve onu orada görünce sinirlenebilir.
Bu durumda hocanıza ne dersiniz?
5.
Bir üniversitede hocasınız.
iki hafta sonra ders anlatacak.
kararlaştırılandan
bir
öğrencilerinizden biri
Bu öğrencinizden dersini
hafta
önce
anlatmasını
istiyorsunuz. Bu durumda ona ne söylersiniz?
6.
Şu anda saat 8.15 ve saat 9.00 da kalkacak uçağa
yetişmek
zorundasınız.
Bir
taksiye
bindiniz,
sizi
Esenboğa Havaalanına yetiştirmesini istiyorsunuz. Ona ne
söylersiniz?
7.
Eve
gelirken
sigara
almayı
unuttunuz.
Kapıcıyı
çağırıp size bir paket sigara almasını istiyorsunuz. Ona
ne söylersiniz?
138
8.
Büyük
bir
film
şirketinde
yöneticisiniz.
yazılması gereken iki iş mektubu var.
Hemen
Sekreterinizin
yapması gereken başka işler varken bu mektupları da bir
saat içinde yazmasını istiyorsunuz.
Ona ne söylersiniz?
ÖZÜRLER
9.
Patronunuzla
unuttunuz,
Asıl
olan
çok
önemli
bir
görüşmesini
iki saat sonra özür dilemek için arıyorsunuz.
sorun
böyle
bir
buluşmayı
ikinci
olmanız.
Ona telefonda ne dersiniz?
10.
koridorunda
Okul
iş
hocanıza
kazara
kitapların düşmesine sebep oldunuz.
bacağı da incindi.
kez
unutuyor
çarpıp
elindeki
Ayrıca hocanızın
Bu tamamen sizin hatanız.
Bu durumda
ona ne söylersiniz?
11.
Hocanızdan bir kitap aldınız ve Çarşamba günü geri
getirmeye söz verdiğiniz halde unuttunuz.
kitabı geri veriyorsunuz.
Bugün Cuma ve
Bu durumda ona ne söylersiniz?
139
12.
Ünlü
bir
lokantada
Müşterilerden
biftek
götürdünüz.
hatırlattı.
13.
birine
garson
olarak
yanlışlıkla
Müşteri
tavuk
size
çalışıyorsunuz.
ızgara
yanlışlığı
kibarca
Bu durumda ona ne dersiniz?
Kızılay'a gitmek için taksiye bindiniz.
olduğu
yerine
Çok aceleniz
için inerken parayı vermeyi unuttunuz.
arkanızdan seslenerek parasını istedi.
Şoför
Bu durumda ona
ne söylersiniz?
14.
Büyük
bir
şirkette personel
şefisiniz.
Ani
bir
toplantı nedeniyle iş için başvuran bir öğrenciyi bir
saat bekletmek zorunda kaldınız.
bekler buldunuz.
15.
Ona ne söylersiniz?
Bir üniversitede hocasınız.
çalışırken
bir
Döndüğünüzde onu sizi
öğrencinin
tamamen sizin suçunuz.
Arabanızı parketmeye
arabasına
çarptınız.
Bu
140
16.
Bir
iş
Sekreteriniz
toplantısında
bu
sözü
bir
kendisine
söz
söylüyorsunuz.
yapılmış
bir
hakaret
olarak algılıyor ve üzülüyor, toplantıdan sonra da size
söylüyor.
141
Appendix B
QUESTIONNAIRE ON SPEECH ACTS
INSTRUCTION
Read the situations carefully.
What would you say in these situations?
Write your answer in the spaces provided.
REQUESTS
SITUATION 1: You are a student at a university.
You have
a very short time to finish up your seminar paper.
You
are
for
asking
your
professor
finishing up the paper.
to
give
an
extension
What would you say to him / her?
SITUATION 2: You apply for a job advertised in a paper.
You are calling the manager of the company to get more
information about the job.
What would you say to him /
her?
SITUATION
3:
You
computer company.
are
a secretary working
for
a big
You know your boss is very busy, but
you have to leave earlier than
asking for permission.
5 pm today.
You are
What would you say to him / her?
142
SITUATION 4: Your teacher is in your house and has just
sat down on your father's favorite chair.
You know your
father will be upset if he finds him/her sitting there
when he returns home in five minutes.
What would you say
to him/her?
SITUATION 5: You are a professor at a university.
One
of your students is going to make a presentation next
week.
But
you
are
asking
him/her
to
make
presentation a week earlier than scheduled.
his/her
What would
you say to him/her?
SITUATION 6: You must catch the plane at 9 pm.
8.15 now.
It is
You take a taxi and ask the driver to take
you to Esenboga Airport.
What would you say to him/her?
SITUATION 7: You have forgotten to buy cigarettes.
You
call the doorman and ask him to buy cigarettes for you.
143
SITUATION 8: You are a manager of a big film company.
You have two business letters to be written soon.
You
are asking your secretary to type them in an hour and
you know she has other work to do.
What would you say
to her?
APOLOGIES
SITUATION
9;
You
have
completely
crucial meeting with your boss.
him to apologize.
forgotten
about
a
Two hours later you call
The problem is that this is the second
time you have forgotten such a meeting.
What would you
say to him/her?
SITUATION
10:
You bump
into a teacher
in the school
corridor causing her to spill her books all over the
floor.
You hurt her leg, too. It is clearly your fault.
What would you say to her?
144
SITUATION 11: You had borrowed your professor's book and
promised
to
return
it
on
Wednesday,
forgotten to bring it back that day.
you are giving the book back.
but
you
have
It is Friday and
What would you say to
him/her?
SITUATION 12: You are a waiter/waitress in a well-known
restaurant.
beef.
You bring fried chicken instead of roast
The customer reminds you politely.
What would
you say to him/her?
SITUATION 13: You take a taxi to Klzlay, but you are in
a hurry and you have forgotten to pay.
You get out.
The taxi driver runs after you and asks for the money.
SITUATION 14: You are the staff manager of a big company.
You have kept an applicant waiting for a job interview
for an hour because you were called to an unexpected
meeting.
An hour later you find him/her waiting for you.
145
SITUATION 15; You are a university teacher.
While you
are trying to park your car you run into a student's car
damaging it seriously.
This is completely your fault.
What would you say to him/her/
SITUATION 16: At a business meeting you say something
that your secretary takes offense to, interpreting it as
a personal insult.
S/he says "I take offence with your
last remark" after the meeting.
him/her?
What would you say to

2.2

Transcription

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